Notitie van Lien

Happy Chinese New Year

2012-01-23T09:06:00.000+01:00

Today it's the start of the Chinese New Year. The coming year is the year of the Dragon, which is my Chinese sign. And although I really don't believe in Astronomy and signs, it gives me a great excuse to publish this wonderful dragon that I shot at the Confusius light Festival in Haren.

Mellow Bakers in Januari ....All Breads baked!!!

2012-01-19T08:45:00.001+01:00

This is the last month of the Mellow Bakers Challenge: Baking "Bread" by Jeffrey Hamelman. All done!

It all started April 2010 and 84 recipes later we've reached the conclusion. A wonderful book with great recipes and technics to understand, make and bake bread. It still is -in my humble view- thé book to purchase when you want to understand how to and bake good bread. My book had it hard, it fell apart during this challenge. The middle part fell out, and however much I glued, it never really stayed put. Lost some of the colour pages that came loose, but it's still sort of together, so I can keep on baking from it. And here are the last breads from this book (all baked a few years back):

Semolina Bread. Here I found out I went wrong. The semolina (durum) bread (page 135) I baked in June last year, was the bread I had to bake this month. So I place the Semolina bread (page 171)here, that I should have used in June.

Semolina (durum) bread with a whole grain soaker. I had to use a little more water to get a good dough. As said before, the use of soakers are really a great way of adding grains and so on to your breads. Love the crunch of the millet.

Five grain levain. A great loaf, though personally I prefer the 5-grain bread with pâte fermentée (p.129).

Roasted garlic levain. A beautiful loaf as well, soft garlic taste and a great accompaniment for soup or stew. Lovely oven rise.

And that's it, done. We can applaud ourselves :) All the breads can be viewed HERE.

Rumour has it that the next Mellow Baker challenge will be baking through the entire book by Dan Lepard "The handmade loaf". I think I'll bake along again. I have the book, I like the book, did bake a few recipes (not many) from it already, I think I'll give it a go. So the Mellow Bakers story will be continued....

Bread Baking Babes and a timesaving bread

2012-01-16T16:58:00.000+01:00

This month our talented Babe Ilva came to the rescue with a recipe from Cuba. An easy loaf and a time saving bread too, 'cause you don't have to preheat the oven and let the bread rise. Yes really, you just shove it into a cold oven! As ovens can differ a lot from one to another, the outcome can be a little different as well. My loaf didn't get as "deep golden brown" as stated in the recipe, even though I baked it a little over 60 minutes. I think my oven heats up rather slow. But nevertheless it was a wonderful white loaf of bread, our kids loved it! Fine crumb, so really perfect for toasting too.

So fresh bread with little effort and less time, now you All want to bake it right?! Become a Bread Baking Buddy, bake, tell us what you think about this bread, blog and sent all your details to Ilva, so she can gather all the breads in a post. Deadline 29th of this month.

Don't forget to check out the other babes to get inspired! Links in the side bar.

CUBAN BREAD
(two loaves)

(PRINT recipe)

1,2-1,4 litre/ 5-6 cups of bread or AP flour
2 packages dry yeast, I used 50 g fresh
1 tbsp salt
2 tbsp sugar
500 ml/ 2 cups hot water
sesame or poppy seeds (optional)

by hand or mixer (15 mins)
Place 4 cups flour in a mixing bowl and add the yeast, salt and sugar. Stir until they are well blended. Pour in the hot water and beat with 100 strong strokes, or three minutes with a mixer flat beater.
Gradually work in the remaining flour (using fingers if necessary), 1/2 cup at a time until the dough takes shape and is no longer sticky.

kneading (8 mins)
Sprinkle the work surface with flour. Work in the flour as you knead, keeping a dusting of it between the dough and the work surface. Knead for 8 minutes by hand or with a dough hook until the dough is smooth, elastic, and feels alive under your hands.

rising (15 mins)
Place the dough in a greased bowl, cover with plastic wrap, and put in a warm (26-37°C/80-100°F) place until double in bulk, about 15 minutes.

shaping (4 mins)
Punch down the dough, turn it out on the work surface, and cut into two pieces. Shape each into a round. Place on the baking sheet. With a sharp knife or razor, slash X on each of the loaves, brush water, and, if desired, sprinkle with sesame or poppy seeds.

Baking (205°C/400°F; 45-50 mins)
Place the baking sheet on the middle shelf of a cold oven. Place a large pan of hot water on the shelf below, and heat the oven to 205°C/400°F. The bread of course, will continue to rise while the oven is heating. Bake for about 50 minutes, or until the loaves are a deep golden brown. Thump on the bottom crusts to test for doneness. If they sound hard and hollow, they are baked.

(source: Bernard Clayton's “New Complete Book of Breads”)

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Bread Baking Babes met een snel brood

Deze maand is onze mega-getalenteerde Babe Ilva de keuken van de maand en zij gaf ons een tijdbesparend brood uit Cuba. Eenvoudig en snel, omdat je het brood geen eindrijs hoeft te geven, je start het brood in een koude (ja KOUDE!) oven, dus geen voorverwarmen. Omdat ovens natuurlijk verschillen en de mijne blijkbaar niet zo woest snel opwarmt, kreeg het brood niet de donkerbruine korst die het recept beschreef en die je bij de andere babes kan zien, ondanks dat ik het brood langer -iets over een uur- heb laten bakken. Maar lekker was het brood wel, een keertje weer helemaal wit geeft blije kinderen. Hoewel ze nooit zeuren over volkoren trouwens.

Ik heb overigens maar 1 brood gebakken (het Engelse recept hierboven gehalveerd), maar je kunt het eenvoudig verdubbelen om twee broden te bakken.

Nou dat klinkt toch alsof je het zelf wilt bakken, hè?! Bak, vertel en blog erover en stuur je gegevens naar onze keukenprinses Ilva, dan kan zij de broden verzamelen zodat we de eindresultaten bij elkaar kunnen zien. Deadline 29e van deze maand. Bezoek voor inspiratie ook de andere Babes (links in de zijkolom).

CUBAANS BROOD

(1 brood)

(recept PRINTEN)

± 385 g broodbloem
2 tl droge gist
1 tl zout
1 el suiker
235 g water
sesam- of maanzaad (optioneel)

Met de hand of mixer (15 min.)
Doe 280 bloem in de mengkom, voeg de gist, zout en suiker toe. Roer door. Giet het water erbij en meng dit (met een lepel of de k-garde van de mixer) ongeveer 3 minuten. Werk langzaam de overige bloem erdoor, 70 g per keer tot het deeg samenkomt en niet meer plakt.

kneden (8 min.)
Kneed met de hand op een bebloemd werkvlak. Of met de deeghaak van de standmixer ongeveer 8 minuten tot het deeg glad, elastisch en veerkrachtig is.

rijzen (15 min.)
Leg het deeg in een ingevette kom, dek af met plastic en laat het op een warme plek rijzen (ongeveer 15-30 minuten) tot het verdubbeld is.

vormen (4 min.)
Duw het deeg terug en vorm het tot een bal. Leg het op een bakplaat (met bakpapier). Optioneel, maak het deeg vochtig en bestrooi met sesam- of maanzaad. Snijd een kruis in de boven kant van de bol.

Bakken (205°C - 45-60 min.)
Schuif het bakblik in het midden van een koude (!) oven. Zet een blik of pan met heet water onderin de oven en zet de oven op 205°C. Het brood zal nu verder rijzen terwijl de oven opwarmt. Bak ongeveer 50 minuten of tot het brood bruin is. Bak langer of korter, afhankelijke van de snelheid waarmee je oven opwarmt. Klop op de onderkant van het brood om te horen of het gaar is (moet hol klinken). Laat afkoelen op een rooster.

(bron : Bernard Clayton's “New Complete Book of Breads”)

Another "commitment"

2012-01-11T16:23:00.002+01:00

I was way too late with the last Mellow Baker post, I am writing my BBBabes post at the last day (minute) lately and I totally forgot the existance of Bread Baking Day (how did that happen?) for two months...so I sure don't sound like a person who needs another challenge to do in blogland, right?! So what do I do?
Of course I jump and take on another chore to do once a month: The Avid Baker's Challenge, 1 book a year, 12 recipes, 1 a month. A baking challenge started by Hanaa and this madness of finding more to do started last night, when I was sleepless for hours and tried to clean my reader (didn't yet), so I visited my lovely and talented fellow babe Karen Baking Soda, who posted about such a wonderful bundt cake. I got inspired. She baked the recipe of this month "Nut Crusted chocolate-banana swirl cake", without the nut crust, without the banana, I just had to laugh, so funny. So yes Karen it's all your fault :). Did I tell you I love bundt cakes? I have way to many bundt pans and love to bake in them.

I noticed the recipes for 2012 are from "The weekend baker" by Abigail Dodge. A book that I happen to have and - shame on me- only baked from it once, for some reason it just didn't work for me when I got it. I haven't bought a book for a while now, 'cause I have just too many that I have never or hardly baked or cooked from. And it was my plan to use the books that I have more this year... so what better opportunity to follow up on my good intentions and step on the ABC bus and give it a go for a year to start. Unfortunately for you all there won't be lots of recipes, which is logical when there are more that a few recipes baked from one book. I you like what you see you can always buy it. This means a little easier on me to, cause I don't have to type the recipes and translate them as well.

Then I read that entries had to be posted on the 1st, 2nd or 3rd of the month.
Sjeez late again, but nothing to do about that, but take the butter, eggs and milk out of the fridge, turn back to bed for an hour to get warm again and bake as soon as everyone is out of the door early this morning. And so I did.

And look at that, I think it looks fabulous :).

The Nut crusted chocolate-banana cake (with nut crust and with banana). As I make diary-free versions of everthing I bake (if possible) I used vegetable margarine and in stead of the buttermilk, I make 'sour' milk, by adding lemon juice to rice (or oat) milk. (this because we have a son with cow milk allergy). Because Dutch buttermilk and even more so my sour milk concoction is quite thin (thinner than US buttermilk), it was all a bit liquidy and that had me worried for a second. But it was all spot on and came out great. Even my marbling -which always looks strange or doesn't look marbled at all when I do it-, wasn't too bad.

Update: I forgot to tell you how it tastes! That's what it's all about isn't it. DE-LI-CI-OUS. Such a great combination chocolate and banana. Even our youngest, who hates bananas, ate it in a flash. Smells wonderful too. A winner!!

Mellow Bakers in December (too late.. oops)

2012-01-07T22:41:00.000+01:00

I can't believe I forgot to post this.. then again, I can believe it, these last weeks of the year are just to busy I guess. Anyway beter late than never as they say, so here are the Decemer breads for the Mellow Bakers Challenge.

66 percent sourdough rye. Even though I'm not a sourdough or a rya fan, this is a really good bread. I had to use less water than the recipe stated. As usual I had to mix my own 'medium rye flour' as I can't buy that here. I mix half whole rye flour and half white rye flour in the hope that this is close to the 'medium rye flour' used the the States.

Sourdough seed bread. This is just such a good looking bread. Light and airy with those little specks of seeds everywhere. I added pinch of yeast in this one as my starter wasn't as fierce as before and I like it that it mildens the sour taste

And the last of the December breads is the un-kneaded, six-fold french bread. It's nice bread, not the best baguette ever, but good. Personally I don't see the point in a no-knead bread, that need so much attention folding it every half hour 6 times. Folding is a great technic to strengthen a dough, especially very wet doughs that are hard to handle. But kneading a baguette and retarding it in the overnight (in the fridge) seems like an easier option to me.

Next time I'll show off the breads for the last time in the Mellow Bakers baking their way through the Jeffrey Hamelman book "Bread". You won't have to wait long as these will be the January breads!

Happy New Year

2011-12-31T13:36:00.000+01:00

Here in the Netherlands we traditionally bake and eat "Oliebollen" and Apple fritters at the end of the year. And even if it's really my husbands' job to deep fry all those treats (cause I hate it), I had to do it this year. The frying man was ill for a few days, then had to go back to work again. So I took courage and fried both oliebollen with raisins,apple and currants and plain ones one day, standing under the carport in a freezing wind and lots of rain. The second day I made the apple fritters ánd these wonderful Italian balls, that are more like cookies, while it was dry and the sun was out!

So I leave you with these wonderful little italian lemon balls to enjoy and wish you all a save and joyful switch into 2012!

Castagnole alla romana

(makes about 30 small fried lemon balls)

(PRINT recipe)

100 g butter, unsalted
400 g AP flour
50 g fine caster sugar
4 large eggs
4 TBsp rum
pinch of salt
grated zest of 1 large lemon
sunflower oil for frying
icing sugar for serving

Melt the butter in a small sauce pan, pour into a large mixing bowl and let it cool. Add the flour, sugar, eggs, rum, salt and zest and stir it together until well mixed. Let rest for 5 minutes.

Shape into chestnut sized balls. Roll between your hands with some flour and place them on plate dusted with flour.
Fry in the hot oil (180ºC) until golden. They puff up a little. Drain on kitchen paper and dust with icing sugar before serving. They are good luke warm, but also cold.

(source: "L'Italia del gusto")

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Prettige jaarwisseling

En we zijn alweer aan het eind van dit jaar gekomen. Terugblikken? Nah, we kijken maar vooruit en hopen dat het dit jaar goed blijft gaan en op sommige gebieden beter zal gaan. Dit jaar hebben we weer zelf oliebollen gebakken, vorig jaar viel dat in het water doordat ik me niet kon bewegen met een zere rug. Dit jaar heb ik zowaar zelf alles gebakken, omdat de bollenbakker hier eerst ziek en toen niet meer vrij was. In twee sessies, één dag onder de carport met harde wind en stromende regen werden de oliebollen naturel én de bollen met rozijnen, krenten en appelstukjes gebakken. De tweede dag, met stralende zon, heb ik de appelbeignets/flappen gebakken én deze kleine citroenbolletjes uit de regio Lazio. Ze zijn fris en te eten als koekjes.

En hiermee wens ik iedereen een hele fijne jaarwisseling en een fantastisch jaar toe vol gezondheid, liefde en begrip!

Castagnole alla romana
(ongeveer 30 kleine citroenballetjes)

(recept PRINTEN)

100 g boter, ongezouten
400 g bloem
50 g fijne kristalsuiker
4 eieren
4 el rum
snuf zout
geraspte schil van 1 grote citroen

zonnebloemolie (voor het frituren)
poedersuiker (voor serveren)

Smelt de boter in een klein pannetje, giet het in een mengkom en laat het even afkoelen.
Voeg dan bloem, suiker, eieren, rum, zout en rasp toe en roer het door tot het goed gemengd is. Laat het 5 minuten staan.

Rol er kleine bolletjes van ter grootte van een walnoot/kastanje. Bebloem hiervoor je handen en leg de balletjes op een bord met bloem, zodat het niet blijft plakken.

Bak de balletjes in hete olie (180ºC) tot ze goudbruin zijn. Ze worden iets groter, maar niet veel. Laat ze goed uitlekken op keukenpapier en bestuif ze met poedersuiker voor het serveren. Ze zijn lekker als ze nog lauwwarm zijn, maar ook prima koud.

(bron: "De smaken van Italië”)

2011-12-24T22:39:00.002+01:00

Happy Christmas Babes

2011-12-16T16:02:00.003+01:00

Almost Christmas, so what could be more appropriate than a Stollen? Our Bread Babe extraordinair Susan gave us this recipe to bake for the holidays. It 's a lot different than the Stollen I'm used to bake this time of year. A lot more butter that's for sure. I love the spices in the bread, eventho I probably went a bit too wild with the nutmeg. This due to my lovely mill for freshly grated nutmeg and the absence of a 1/3 teaspoon for measuring. But it was very delicious.This was also the opportunity to use the black cherries that I dehydrated in summer, delicious. Even the kids loved it a lot. I was worried that they would start complaining about the absence of the almond paste roll in the bread that they're used to, but they didn't even mentioned it!

I had my worries while making the dough, but I left it mixing for a long time (as Susan said) and that really did the trick. Very easy to handle afterwards. Souple and elastic. The dough was no quick riser. All that butter made it slow I guess. But in the end it turned out alright I guess. Shaping could have been better, during the rise the topflap retreated a little, so not perfect.

Oh yes I almost forgot.... You wanna get in the holiday mood too with this stollen? Bake, post and tell us about it. Send your details to Susan so she can whip up a round up when she's back on earth again. Did you know today is her wedding day? Congratulations Susan and Jay!!

Don't forget to check out what the other Babes made of this stollen (links in the sidebar).

Stollen
(Yield: 1500 grams = 3 loaves, more or less)

(PRINT recipe)

Time:

Candy and dry citrus peel: 12 hours or more (can be done ahead)

Soak the fruits: 12 hours

Mix and ferment sponge: 12 hours (can be simultaneous with fruit-soaking)

Mix dough: 20 – 30 minutes

First fermentation : 30 minutes

Preshape, rest, and shape: 30 minutes

Proof: 90 minutes

Bake: 30 minutes

Soaked Fruit Ingredients:

130 grams raisins

75 grams dried cherries (or more raisins)

61 grams candied orange peel

92 grams candied lemon peel

82 grams slivered almonds

34 grams rum

Toss the soaked fruits with the rum in a medium bowl. Cover and leave at room temperature for about 12 hours.

Sponge Ingredients:

120 grams flour

80 grams water

0.1 gram (small pinch) instant yeast [or 0.13 g active dry, or 0.25 g fresh]

Meanwhile, combine the sponge ingredients in another medium bowl. Cover and ferment at room temperature for 12 hours.

Final Dough Ingredients:
●348 g flour
●53 g milk
●25.3 grams (2 Tablespoons + 2 teaspoons) instant yeast, or 63.3 g fresh]
●8 g (1-1/3 t.) salt
●8 g (2-1/3 t.) diastatic malt powder (omit if you don’t have it)
●51 g sugar
●50 g egg (about one large egg)
●5 g grated lemon zest (one average lemon)
●5 g grated orange zest (one small orange)
●1/3 t. of each of these ground spices: cinnamon, cardamom, cloves, allspice, nutmeg
●273 g unsalted butter, at room temperature (should be pliable)
●all of the sponge
●all of the soaked fruits

Finishing Ingredients:
●clarified butter
●fine granulated sugar
●powdered (confectioner’s) sugar

Method:
In the bowl of a stand mixer with a dough hook, combine all of the final dough
ingredients except the soaker. Mix in slow speed until all the ingredients are
incorporated. Continue mixing in medium speed until the gluten reaches full development. The dough should come together around the hook and should no longer stick to the sides and bottom of the bowl. This could take about 20 minutes or more, but will depend on your mixer.

Add the soaked fruits and mix on slow speed just until they are evenly distributed
through the dough. Transfer the dough to a lightly buttered container. Cover and ferment for 30 minutes at room temperature.

Turn the dough onto the counter. Divide into three pieces, or however many you would
like. Preshape the dough into balls and let them rest, covered, for 30 minutes.
To shape each loaf: Form a blunt-ended batard and dust it lightly with flour. With a thin
rolling pin, press down firmly, separating about 2/5 of the dough from the other 3.5. Roll
out the flap of dough connecting the sections so it is about 2 inches wide. Flatten the
larger section slightly with your hand, then fold the smaller section over to rest on the
larger one. Place the loaves on parchment-lined baking sheets (two per sheet) and slip them into a large plastic bag with a bowl of warm water. Proof for about 90 minutes, replenishing the water when it cools.

Meanwhile, preheat the oven to 375 on convection setting or 400 on regular bake
setting. You will also need steam during the initial phase of baking, so prepare for this
now. Bake for 10 minutes, open the oven door briefly to allow any remaining steam to escape,
and bake for another 20 minutes. If you do not have convection, you may need to rotate
the position of the baking sheets halfway through the bake to ensure even browning and
keep the one on the lower rack from burning on the bottom.

While the loaves are still warm, brush them with clarified butter. Dredge them in fine
granulated sugar, brushing or shaking off the excess. To finish, sift powdered sugar over the loaves. Cut when completely cool. You can leave the stollen out overnight to let the loaves dry
and the sugar crust up a bit.

(Adapted from San Francisco Baking Institute )

Mellow Bakers in November..almost done

2011-11-28T21:18:00.000+01:00

Still baking for the Mellow Baker Challenge, still baking every recipe in the book "Bread" by Jeffrey Hamelman. But we're not far from the end. I'm not totally sure but there are about 6 breads to bake (or less?). Some ideas about a new project are already being explored, if you'd like to bake along (again) the next project you can fill in this poll, what kind of challenge you prefer. Two more months to go. But first things first: it's Novembers turn and we've been baking three breads as usual, let's have a look.

Five-grain sourdough with rye sourdough. I'm a big fan of multigrain breads and this one - even if I have been baking this way back in 2006- is a wonderful loaf. Look how airy it is.

Golden raisin and walnut bread. A nice bread, but not very special. Not enough raisins or walnuts inside to be a real raisin bread. Nice, but not something that'll be baked again soon.

And finally there is this wonderful Fougasse with olives. Me and my husband both don't like olives at all, still both our kids love them, so this lovely chewy fougasse was gone in no time at all.

More from the Mellow Baker Challenge next month.

Bread Baking Babes are having coffee and some cake of course!

2011-11-16T21:28:00.000+01:00

Wow it has been quiet here. The last post was a whole month ago. Glad the Babes are here again, so you finally get to read something new. First some coffee to wake me up. The lovely Tanna is the kitchen queen of this month and brought some cake to go with it.

I only made half the recipe into one very large bread/cake and changed a few things. So the recipe below is how I baked it (for the original babe recipe go to Tanna's). I used whole wheat flour instead of the white whole wheat flour, because that is not available here. I don't remember if I did half the topping too, I thought I did, but according to my notes in the recipe I didn't, I halved all ingredients, except the nuts. Not intentional, but I just mixed it up by mistake. Other changes are more flour and a longer baking time. Even though it's a coffee cake, we've eaten it like bread. It was a bit more like bread, because of the whole wheat flour too. No bother in putting something on top, as it's all ready to go. They were really fond of it here and it was gone in no time. Very good! Thanks Tanna for this lovely recipe.

Sure you'll like to bake this wonderful cake/ bread too and be our Bread Baking Buddy this month. Bake, write and post about it and let us know how it all turned out. If you don't blog, you can send in too, with comments on how you liked it and how it turned out. Did you make any changes.. ecc. So we can all learn from our baking together. Send your details to Tanna and she'll fix a wonderful round up with all the entries!

Streusel Potato Cake (Kartoffel Kuchen)

Yield: 1 very large (10”) round cake or two small (8” round cakes)

(PRINT recipe)

½ pound (227 g) russet or all purpose potato, peeled and cubed
4 Tbsp (60 g) butter, cut into pieces
1 tsp dry yeast
⅜ cup (75 g) soft light brown sugar
1 large eggs
2 ½ - 3 cups (350 - 420 g) AP flour
¾ cups (105 g) whole wheat flour
⅛ tsp nutmeg, freshly grated
2 TBsp flax seed meal
¼ tsp salt

Streusel:
¼ cup (30 g) small oat flakes
¼ cup (35 g) whole wheat flour
½ cup (100 g) light brown sugar
½ tsp cinnamon
4 TBsp (60 g) butter
⅜ cup (135 g) walnuts or pecans or almonds
2 heaped TBsp (30 g) yellow raisins

Cook potatoes until very tender, just falling apart. Drain and reserve potato water.
Rice or mash the potatoes. Combine with butter and 205 ml warm potato water. Allow butter to melt and water to cool to luke warm.
In a standing mixer bowl: mix together the potatoes, potato water & butter, yeast, sugar, eggs and 1 cups of flour. Beat until smooth. This is VERY liquid at this point. Cover the sponge with plastic and leave in a warm place until it's bubbling happily.
In the original recipe this takes 1 hour, you can also leave the sponge in the fridge for about 5 hours.
Stir in remaining 1,5 cups flour, nutmeg and salt using the dough hook (or strong wooden spoon) for about 5 minutes. Dough should be smooth. Add more flour if needed (I did) to make a workable dough. Cover again & leave to rise until doubled. (you can also let it rise in the fridge overnight)
Punch the dough down and turn out onto a lighty floured surface. Shape into a round. Place into a greased 10-inch round cake pans.
Preheat oven to 400° at least 20 minutes.
For the Streusel: Stir flour, brown sugar and cinnamon together in a bowl and add butter.Mix together creating a soften mixture with dark color and sticky texture. Work in the nuts and raisins. Sprinkle streusel over the cakes. When cakes are covered, dimple the cakes with your fingers - much like dumpling foccacia. Dimpling will bury some of the crumbs and leave others on the top.
Cover with greased plastic and allow to rise in a warm place until doubled, taking about 45 minutes. After the rise I pushed the filling down in some spots with my finger for the second time.
Bake cakes at 400°F (200ºC) 40 - 60 minutes. until cooked in the middle (check with a thermometer). Tent with foil if it gets too brown. Cool on rack, but this is also good lukewarm.

(Adapted from: “One Potato, Two Potato” - Roy Finamore)

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Bread Baking Babes op de koffie

Het is hier akelig stil de laatste tijd, gelukkig maar dat de Bread Baking Babes iedere maand wat bakken wat gepubliceerd moet worden, dan hebben jullie toch nog een keer wat nieuws te lezen. Deze maand is Tanna de chef en we bakken samen met haar een aardappelbrood met een kruimellaag. Ik noem het in het Nederlands toch maar brood (i.p.v. "cake" zoals in het Engels), want het is meer een zoet brood dan een cake in onze taal. Maar je kunt hem natuurlijk wel uitstekend eten bij de koffie!

Het hieronderstaande recept heb ik veranderd zoals ik 'm gebakken heb. Ik heb het halve recept gebruikt en er 1 groot rond brood van gemaakt. Verder aanpassingen met name in de baktijd en de hoeveelheid bloem.

Heb je zin om dit brood met ons mee te bakken? Word dan een Bread Baking Buddy, bak, schrijf en blog erover. Wat je er van vond, hoe het verliep en of je veranderingen hebt aangebracht. Stuur je gegevens en je uitkomst naar Tanna, dan kan zij alle inzendingen bij elkaar zetten in een post.

Aardappelbrood met kruimellaag
maakt 1 groot rond brood (26 cm) of 2 kleine (22 cm)

(recept PRINTEN)

227 g geschilde aardappel, in stukjes (kruimige)

60 g boter, in stukjes
1 tl droge gist
75 g gele basterd suiker
1 groot ei
350 - 420 g brood bloem
105 g volkoren tarwemeel
⅛ tl nootmuskaat, vers geraspt
2 el gemalen lijnzaad (optioneel)
¼ tl zout

Kruimellaag:
30 g kleine havervlokken
35 g volkoren tarwemeel
100 g gele basterdsuiker
½ tl kaneel
60 g boter
135 g walnoten, pecannoten of amandelen (ik heb amandelstukjes gebruikt)
30 g blanke rozijnen (of gewoon bruine)

Kook de aardappels tot ze helemaal gaar zijn, giet ze af en bewaar het kookwater! Pureer de aardappels. Meng de boter erdoor en 205 ml warm kookwater. Laat de boter smelten en laat het afkoelen tot lauwwarm.
Meng de aardappels, kookwater en boter, gist, suiker, ei en 140 g meel in een mixerkom., meng het tot het min of meer glad is. Het is nu nog zeer nat deeg. Dek dit voordeeg af met plastic en laat het op een warme plek staan tot het begint te bubbelen. Dit duurt ongeveer 1 uur, maar je kunt het voordeeg ook een aantal uren in de koelkast zetten.
Roer nog 210 g bloem, nootmuskaat en zout erdoor met de kneedhaak, ongeveer 5 minuten lang. Het deeg moet min of meer glad zijn. Voeg meer bloem toe indien nodig (ik had het nodig) tot je een werkbaar deeg hebt. Dek het af en laat het nogmaals rijzen tot het verdubbeld is. Je kunt het deeg ook ‘s nachts in de koelkast laten rusten.
Duw het deeg terug en leg het op een licht bebloemd werkvlak en vorm het tot een bal. Druk het tot een schijf en leg het in de ronde bakvorm, die je licht ingevet hebt.
Verwarm de oven voor op 200°C
Maak de kruimellaag door bloem, suiker, kaneel en boter in een kom te mengen met je vingers tot je kruimels krijgt. Voeg noten en rozijnen toe en meng die erdoor. Strooi deze kruimels over het deeg. Duw het daarna met je vingers her en der in het deeg. Sommige kruimels blijven hierdoor bovenop en andere komen in de cake.
Dek af met ingevet plastic en laat he top een warme plaats rijzen tot het verdubbeld is. Na deze rijs heb ik nogmaals op enkele punten de kruimellaag in het deeg geduwd.
Bak de cake op 200ºC 40 - 60 minutes tot het gaar is (controleer met een thermometer, in
het midden moet het ongeveer 93ºC zijn). Dek af met alufolie als de bovenkant te snel bruint. Laat afkoelen op een rooster, maar lauwwarm is het ook erg lekker!

(bewerkt naar: “One Potato, Two Potato” - Roy Finamore)

Bread Baking Babes bake Fougasse

2011-10-16T18:59:00.002+02:00

Yes it's World Bread Day today.... but also the publishing day of our monthly Bread Baking Babes assignment. So now for the Bread Baking Babe post! This month Elizabeth gave us a free hand in baking, as long as it was a Fougasse. So what's Fougasse all about? CRUST! Cuts in the dough give us more crust and less crumb and as it's almost a flat bread... even more crust.

We could use our favorite dough recipe to make the fougasse, and fill it with the filling of our choice (or leave it plain). Make a ladder or a leaf shape. I like the leaf shape best, but as I made plenty of those already, I decided to make the ladder one this time. It was also easier to get them on the stone side by side this way. I did not fill it, 'cause I just made some hummus that went really well with it.

If you like crusts too, bake along and sent your entry to Elizabeth. (deadline 29 October). Take a peak at the other Fougasse that the Babes baked. (Links in the side bar)

Fougasse

(makes two)

ingredients

Your Favourite Bread Dough
Corn Meal
pizza stone, vaguely optional but highly recommended

preparation
Mix, knead and allow your favourite bread dough to rise to double. If you are adding anything like olives, sun-dried tomatoes, onions, caramelized garlic cloves and/or walnuts, mix them into the dough near the end of kneading it or on the first turn of the dough. If you are wanting herbs/spices on top, please add them just before baking.

Shaping: About an hour before baking the fougasse, turn the dough out onto a lightly floured board and press it out into an oval (or a rectangle; or a circle). Using a floured rolling pin, roll the dough out until it is about 1 cm (1/2 in.) thick.
Sprinkle corn meal on the peel - or an upside-down cookie sheet. Lay the shaped dough on the peel. Using a pizza wheel and "swift, decisive strokes" cut a design of a leaf or ladder into the dough. Take care not to cut through the outer edges. From the edges, pull the dough outwards to make sure the cuts are spaced. Cover with a clean tea towel followed by a plastic grocery bag and allow to rise. (Robertson allows the shaped bread to rise first and does the slashes at the last minute. Naturally, because of my stellar reading skills, I didn't notice that until I had already made fougasse several times by slashing it directly after shaping it.) ³
Just Before Baking: Drizzle with olive oil and scatter coarsely ground sea salt over top. (You can also do this step just after the bread is baked; that is what Robertson suggests. Or you can forget to add the olive oil at all, as I did the last time.)
Baking in the Oven: Put a pizza stone on the middle or top shelf of the oven and turn it to 400F (200C). Transfer the fougasse onto the hot stone and bake for about 15 minutes, turning it around at least once to account for uneven oven heat.
When the fougasse done, remove it from the heat and allow to cool on a well-ventilated rack. To serve, break it apart and dip it into good quality olive oil with herbs if you want.

(inspired by Chad Robertson's fougasse recipe on page 139 in "Tartine Bread" and Patricia Wells' fougasse recipe on page 191 in "Patricia Wells at Home in Provence")

_____________________________________________________________

I used this dough:
Focaccia Dough

1 tsp dry yeast
300-330 g water
1 TBsp olive oil
1 tsp malt syrup
350 g bread flour
140 g whole wheat flour
1 tsp salt

Mix all the ingredients in a spiral mixer until you have a souple dough. Place in a greased bowl, cover and let rise until it doubles.

(based on the focaccia recipe in "The Italian Baker" by Carol Field)

World Bread Day 2011

2011-10-16T16:38:00.001+02:00

Today it's WORLD BREAD DAY!! The sixth time that this blogevent is on. Initiated by Zorra and the fifth time I participate. I missed the first year, because I just started my blog then and it was just 2 weeks old then. Which reminded me that I totally missed my 5 year blog anniversary.

So here it goes baking for the World Bread Day event and I choose semolina bread. I just love to make and eat of course!! bread with semolina durum flour. It has a wonderful nutty taste, which is enhanced by the sesame seeds. This flour can behave tricky sometimes, quicker to rise, quicker to overknead, but with wonderful end results. So have fun baking and we're looking forward in seeing all the entries soon at Zorra's.

Semolina rounds with black sesame seeds
(makes two loaves)

(PRINT recipe)

Biga
⅛ tsp dry yeast

200 g warm water

230 g bread flour

Dough

57 g warm water

1 tsp dry yeast

177 g water

283 g biga

520 g durum flour

57 g cornmeal (optional: extra cornmeal for sprinkling)

35 g black sesame seeds (divided)

10 g salt

Make the biga the day before baking by stirring the ingredients together, cover with plastic and let rise at room temperature for 6 to 8 hours. Or 1 hour at room temperature and then overnight in the fridge. Take it out of the fridge 3 hours before using it.

Combine the warm water and yeast and let stand for a few minutes. Add the cooler water and biga and break it up with your fingers. Add the flours and 2 TBsp of the sesame seeds and start kneading it until it’s a souple dough. Add a little water or flour to get the right consistency of the dough if needed.
Place in a greased bowl, cover and let rest for 20 minutes. Knead it for a few minutes more, put back in the greased bowl and let it rise again until nearly doubled in volume.

Divide the dough in two equal parts. Take one part and shape it into a long strand, then shape the strand into a coil. Repeat with the second piece of dough. Place one parchment paper.

Use a little water to wet the spiral groove of the loaves and then sprinkle the remaining black sesame seeds into the groove. Cover with greased plastic and let rise until almost doubled in volume. In the meantime preheat the oven to 425ºF/220ºC with a baking stone.

Place the loaves on the baking stone. Create steam by pouring hot water in a metal container on the bottom of the oven (also preheated) and close the door. Bake for 20 minutes, then lower the temperature to 375ºF/190ºC until the loaf is golden yellow, and sounds lightly hollow when tapped on the bottom.

(source: “Amy’s Bread” - Amy Scherber)

After summer delight

2011-10-03T08:40:00.001+02:00

Wasn't it a great little summer after summer this week. All this rain was so depressing. So here's a recipe for you with a special fruit that takes you back to summer. When in Italy you see these bushes growing (found a few pictures of them too)... fruits are not yet ripe during our summer holidays. Very surprised to bump into these prickly pears here in the Netherlands. Never saw them here before, but that doesn't always mean they're not for sale I guess. So if you can get a hold of them, don't hesitate.

Cut of the prickles and peel with gloves on, holding the fruit steady by sticking a fork in it. Cut the top and bottom off, then holding it upright with the fork pricked in the top, cut of the sides.

The taste reminded me of watermelon, but with more flavour. Really refreshing and perfect for a warm day... but tastes great on a rainy day too. Or after a spicy meal to cool your mouth. The taste of summer.

Prickly pear sorbet
(about 1 liter)

(PRINT recipe)

500 g prickly pear (cactus pear)
250 g water
100 g sugar

Make a sugar syrup with the water and the sugar, by dissolving the sugar in the water on medium heat. Leave to cool.
Peel the prickly pears and cut into pieces
Place sugar syrup and pear pieces in a blender and blend until smooth. Pass through a sieve if there are any seeds in the mixture, and refrigerate for about 2 hours.

Churn in your ice cream maker for about 20-30 minutes.
Spoon it all in a freezer container and freeze for 1 or 2 hours to firm up.

(adapted from “Gelato!” – P.S. Johns)

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Na-zomers genieten

Wat een luxe dat we toch nog even zo'n kort nazomertje hadden hier, de slechte zomer was toch wel deprimerend. Ik was blij verrast toen ik hier in Nederland cactusvijgen tegen het lijf liep. Nou ja gelukkig niet letterlijk, want er zitten venijnige stekels op. Perfect voor een nazomerse dag. In Italië op vakantie zien we de cactussen wel staan, met mini vruchtjes en soms nog met bloemen. Rijpe vruchten zijn er dan nog niet.

Met het vruchtvlees kan je een heerlijke sorbet maken. Snijdt kop en kont eraf (houdt de vrucht vast met een vork of eventueel handschoenen) en daarna de zijkanten. Kom niet aan de stekels, maar dat lijkt me logisch toch?
De smaak doet denken aan watermeloen, maar met wat meer smaak. Heel verfrissend en weer eens wat anders. Heerlijk op een warme dag, maar ook perfect als afsluiting van een pittige maaltijd. Dus loop jij ze ook tegen het lijf? Aarzel niet en koop ze!

Cactusvijgensorbet
(ongeveer 1 liter)

(recept PRINTEN)

500 g cactusvijgen
250 g water
100 g suiker

Maak een suikersiroop van de suiker en het water, door de suiker op te lossen in een pannetje op medium vuur. Laat afkoelen.
Schil de cactusvijgen en snijd ze in stukken. Doe de stukken en de siroop in de blender en mix tot het helemaal glad is. Werk het door een zeef om eventuele zaden te verwijderen en zet het minimaal 2 uur in de koelkast laten staan.

Laat het mengsel in de ijsmaker draaien ongeveer 20-30 minuten.
Schep alles in een diepvriesdoos en laat het 1 à 2 uur vriezen voor serveren.

(bewerkt naar “Gelato!” – P.S. Johns)

Mellow Bakers in Oktober

2011-10-02T13:21:00.000+02:00

There we are with another month of Mellow Bakers Baking. Baking our way through the Jeffrey Hamelton's book "Bread". We're nearing the end slowly but surely. About nine more to go but I'm not sure. This months breads are all delicious and fun to make.

Sunflower seed bread with Pâte Fermentée.

Made a few years back, but still a great bread to bake and eat. We just love bread with lots of seeds.

Sesame Bread Sticks.

Delicious snack, to eat all by itself, or with soup, a glass of wine... anytime really. Fun to make, fun to bake.

Berne Brot

So delicious this bread, reminds me a lot of challah. Fluffy and light... yummy!
I made two loaves, both with four strands, but with two different braiding techniques (also in the book). The first picture is made with method 2 (page 301) and gives a flatter broader loaf. The two other pictures used method 1 (page 300) and that makes a higher loaf.

Braiding methods

They're not for this month especially but I'm just trying to use all the braiding methods from the book, and here are a few more I make. I did a three braid of course (method 1 and two, makes no difference in looks), the six strands; two ways (p. 304), a tiered braids: double-decker (p.309) and triple-decker braid (page 310) even though that one slided sideways in the oven. Then there were the winston knot (p.306) and three methods for 1 strand rolls (p.294). Here are two more to add to the list, both made with the challah recipe on page 240/292. The first one with two strands (method 2). A perfect quick way to braid and still have a great result.

The next one with 5 strands, worked good too. A shame that during baking the straight line got a bit lost. So just a few braids to make and they're done too. Yes I know, I'm taking this real serious :)

Mellow Bakers in September

2011-09-30T13:11:00.002+02:00

Last day of September, better get this post out at once. The weather is fantastic this week, but there's not much to enjoy as I'm not feeling too well. Bad headaches and sleepless nights. That's why this post just didn't happen sooner. So here are this months breads baked for the Mellow Baker Challenge (baking our way through J.Hamelman's "Bread").

Mixed Flour Miche.
I baked this one way back in 2006. As a miche is a very large loaf, it´s sometimes tricky to get it cooked through. These days I use a thermometer to measure the temp inside the bread, in 2006 were still my early learning days of many bread baking years to follow and I didn´t have that equipment just yet. Still it turned out good.

Whole rye and whole wheat bread. Whole grain breads are most baked and eaten in our house, because it has more flavour, is healthier ánd takes you further after eating it. And I can bake something all or partly white without feeling guilty when I feel like it.

This is a bread made with sourdough and a bit of yeast, which is always aa good combination, if gives the depth of flavour, less sour taste and no worries that it won't rise because of a inefficient starter. You can see my bread baking skills have progressed from baking in 2006 too.

Whole wheat bread with Pecans and golden raisins. A wonderful straight dough to handel and nuts and raisins always tickle my tastebuds in a good way. Very nice bread.

So far these months breads. Happy baking!

Bread Baking Babes' pretzel-party

2011-09-17T21:27:00.004+02:00

It's Bread Baking Babes times again... * cough* ahem... at least it was yesterday. yes I'm late, sorry. I had them baked on the 16th, but didn't get around in making a post. So here it is. Our wonderful Babe Elle is kitchen of the month and she picked a wonderful recipe, soft pretzels. And you can make them either savory or sweet... or both. Or just plain, I tried all versions. The plain one is delicious, twice brushed with egg wash, it tasted like an egg sandwich... yum. The one just with salt or with the sesame seeds.. yum yum. The cinnamon ones.. luke warm... yum yum yum.

I'm not very good with dough that has to be cooked in water first, my bagels always look like 90 year olds. These weren't even as bad looking as I feared, and the cinnamon sugar covered all the wrinkles :) A lovely choice, thanks Elle!

If you want to bake, do so, make your favorite topping ..... or just try them all, post and send your details to Elle. Deadline 29th of the month. For inspiration check out the other Babes Pretzels (links in the side bar).

Soft Pretzels
YIELD: 8 pretzels

(PRINT recipe)

1 package dry yeast (7 g)
1 1/2 tsp sugar
235 g warm water (100°F to 110°F)
350 g all-purpose flour, divided (2 1/2 cups total)
1 tsp salt
Cooking spray
2 TBsp baking soda
1 tsp cornmeal
1 tsp water
1 small egg
2 tsp kosher salt

Dissolve yeast and sugar in warm water in a large bowl, and let stand for 5 minutes.
Lightly spoon flour into dry measuring cups; level with a knife. Add 2 cups flour and 1 teaspoon salt to yeast mixture; stir until a soft dough forms. Turn dough out onto a lightly floured surface; knead until smooth and elastic (about 8 minutes). Add enough of remaining flour, 1 tablespoon at a time, to prevent dough from sticking to hands (dough will feel slightly sticky).

Place dough in a large bowl coated with cooking spray, turning to coat top. Cover and let rise in a warm place (85°), free from drafts, 40 minutes or until doubled in size. (Gently press two fingers into dough. If indentation remains, the dough has risen enough.) Punch dough down; cover and let rest 5 minutes. Preheat oven to 425°.

Divide dough into 8 equal portions. Working with one portion at a time (cover remaining dough to prevent drying), roll each portion into an 18-inch-long rope with tapered ends. Cross one end of rope over the other to form a circle, leaving about 4 inches at end of each rope.
Twist the rope at the base of the circle. Fold the ends over the circle and into a traditional pretzel shape, pinching gently to seal. Place pretzels on a baking sheet lightly coated with cooking spray. Cover and let rise 10 minutes (pretzels will rise only slightly).

Combine 6 cups water and baking soda in a large saucepan. Bring to a boil; reduce heat, and simmer. Gently lower 1 pretzel into simmering water mixture; cook 15 seconds. Turn pretzel with a slotted spatula; cook an additional 15 seconds. Transfer pretzel to a wire rack coated with cooking spray. Repeat procedure with remaining pretzels.

Place pretzels on a baking sheet sprinkled with cornmeal. Combine 1 tsp water and egg in a small bowl, stirring with a fork until smooth. Brush a thin layer of egg mixture over pretzels; sprinkle with kosher salt.

Bake at 425° for 12 minutes or until pretzels are deep golden brown. Transfer to a wire rack to cool.

To make Cinnamon Sugar Soft Pretzels:When you put on the egg glaze in the above recipe, don't add any toppings. When the pretzels are baked and still a little warm, dip them in melted butter and then into a cinnamon-sugar mixture.

(adapted from: http://www.myrecipes.com/recipe/soft-pretzels)

_________________________________________________________________

Bread Baking Babes bakken pretzels

Zachte Pretzels
(8 pretzels)

(recept PRINTEN)

Ingrediënten
1 zakje droge gist (7 g)
1 1/2 tl suiker
235 g lauwwarm water
350 g bloem
3/4 tl zout
bakspray
2 el baking soda
1 tl maismeel
1 tl water
1 klein ei
decoratie: bv. grof zout, sesamzaadjes, kaneelsuiker

Bereiding
Los de gist en suiker op in het water in een grote (mixer) kom en laat het 5 minuten staan.
Voeg ⅔ van de bloem toe, samen met het zout en meng dit tot het samenkomt. Kneed het deeg dan(met de kneedhaak of de hand), en voeg genoeg bloem toe om een soepel, niet te kleverig en elastisch deeg te maken.
Doe het deeg in een licht ingevette kom, dek af en laat rijzen tot het verdubbeld is. (als je zachtjes met twee vingers in het deeg drukt en de indruk te zien blijft, is het deeg genoeg gerezen. Druk het deeg naar beneden, dek af en laat het 5 minuten rusten. Verwarm de oven voor op 220°C.

Verdeel het deeg in 8 gelijke delen. Werk met één portie per keer (houd de rest ondertussen afgedekt zodat het niet uitdroogt). Rol elk stuk uit tot een 45 cm lange sliert. Vorm een rondje met de sliert, waarbij de uiteinden 10 cm uitsteken., Draai de twee uiteinden 1x om elkaar waar de slierten over elkaar liggen. Vouw de uiteinden over de cirkel en druk zachtjes de slierten vast. Leg de pretzels op een licht ingevette bakplaat. Dek af met ingevet plastic en laat ze 10 minuten rijzen (ze rijzen niet veel).

Doe ander halve liter water en de baking soda in een pan en breng het aan de kook,. Verlaag de temperatuur zodat het net tegen de kook aan zit. Laat voorzichtig een pretzel in het water zakken, keer hem na 15 seconden om en kook de andere kant ook 15 seconden. Haal de pretzel eruit en leg hem op een ingevet rooster. Herhaal dit met de rest van de pretzels.

Leg de pretzels op een bakplaat licht bestrooid met maismeel. Klop het ei met 1 el water en bestrijk de pretzels ermee. (eventueel kan je dit ook twee maald doen). Bestrooi de pretzels met wat grof zout of sesamzaad. (wil je kaneelsuiker pretzels maken, dan alleen met ei bestrijken).

Bak ongeveer 15 minuten of totdat ze bruin zijn. Laat ze afkoelen op een rooster.

Om Kaneelsuiker pretzels te maken:
Als de pretzels uit deoven komen en ze nog een beetje warm zijn bestrijk ze met gesmolten boter en bestrooi ze met kaneelsuiker.

(bewerkt naar: http://www.myrecipes.com/recipe/soft-pretzels)

Bread Baking Day # 43

2011-09-01T15:26:00.000+02:00

Last day to post my entry for the Bread Baking Day. I was planning on skipping it. We've got back from our Italian holiday 1,5 weeks ago and I totally felt weird. Maybe not only the temperture shock, I don't know, but I felt totally lost and depressed being back here. Could hardly remember the last three weeks. And suddenly I was back in this boring (cold) routine and I couldn't shift gear. But slowly I'm adapting again to living my plain life and decided to bake for Bread Baking Day after all, the event initiated by Zorra and this time hosted by Judy ("Judy gross eats"). I love her theme "Onion breads", they give such a great smell in the kitchen and tastes great too! I choose to make rolls using Spring onions, as I had them in the fridge and they are mellow in taste. In combination with tomatoes always good, I'd have added a little bit of cheese too if I didn't have to bear our son's milk allergy in mind.... then it would have been almost like a ball shaped pizza. But this was just fine, the semolina gives a bit of a bite and we all enjoyed them a lot.

Spring onion and dried tomato rolls
(makes 12)

(PRINT recipe)

sponge

100 g bread flour

50 g water

2 g fresh yeast or a pinch dry yeast

dough

250 g bread flour

150 g fine semolina

13 g fresh yeast or 5 g dry yeast

270-300 g water

25 g olive oil

13 g honey

13 g salt

4 spring onions, chopped (white and green part)

60 g sun dried tomatoes (soaked in water and drained), in small pieces

Sponge

mix all the ingredients for the sponge, knead well. Place in a bowl, cover with plastic wrap and let stand for 4 hours.

Dough

Place flour, semolina, yeast, water, oil, honey and salt in a mixing bowl and start kneading, when it is beginning to come together add the sponge in pieces. Knead until you have a souple dough. Let it rest. Take the dough out, flatten it on a lightly oiled surface and sprinkle the spring onion and tomato pieces over it. Roll it up and knead a little to incorporate them into the dough.

Place in a lightly oiled bowl, cover and let rise until doubled.

Divide the dough into 12 equal pieces and roll them into rolls. Place on baking parchment on a baking sheet. Cover with greased plastic and let rise until almost doubled.

In the meantime preheat your oven to 220ºC, preferably with ovenstone.

Sprinkle a little semolina on the rolls and slash them crosswise.

Bake them until light golden (about 18-24 minutes). Let them cool on a wire rack.

(adapted from “Pane” - Anna Gennari)

__________________________________________________________

Bread Baking Day nr. 43

Nederlandse versie volgt z.s.m.!!

Bread Baking Babes meet in Vienna

2011-08-16T08:00:00.002+02:00

Where to go on holiday... let's go to Vienna and meet up with Astrid our lovely Austrian Babe that picked some Bread from Vienna for us. Just perfect to make into a loaf, a braid, rolls (kaiserrolls) or topped with a Dutch crust as P. Reinhart suggests. That really is Dutchy meets Viennese! My kids love you for this choice Astrid, it's bread with such a fluffy crumb: just delicious. I made one loaf with a Dutch crust topping ("Tiger bread" as we call that here), but I think I spread it too thick. I never made a tigerloaf before, but I'll try this again for sure. I also made some kaiserrolls, they are always a big hit here... though I didn't have much time to fold them by hand. I tried one, but that just didn't come out very well. So I just pressed the rest of the rolls with a 'stamp' for kaisersemmel. (I have one with a circle in the middle) to get on with it. That's another thing I will make and try again when I'll have more time. Astrid makes it look so easy and really it's such a lovely thing to do by hand. So thank you Astrid for this wonderful and tasty recipe and I'll make some more later!!! Wouldn't it be nice to meet up for real in Vienna some day and eat some Viennese bread?! :)

You'll all want to make this, get your flour, bake, make a picture and email your details to Astrid to become a Bread Baking Buddy! Deadline 29th of this month.

VIENNA BREAD

(makes two 1 pound loaves or 9-12 rolls)

(PRINT recipe)

First make the Pâte Fermentée
(makes 16-17 ounces)
1 1/8 cups (5 ounces) unbleached all-purpose flour
1 1/8 cups (5 ounces) unbleached bread flour
3/4 teaspoon (.19 ounces) salt
1/2 teaspoon (.055 ounces) instant yeast
3/4 cup (+ 2 tablespoons) (6-7 ounces) water, room temperature

Stir together salt, yeast and flours. Add 3/4 water mix on low speed with paddle attachment until everything comes together. The dough should be neither too sticky nor too stiff. When touched with finger it should stick to finger but be easily released.
Transfer dough on counter sprinkled with some flour. Knead until dough is soft and pliable (tacky, not sticky!) Knead for 4-6 minutes.
Oil your bowl and transfer dough to the bowl coating it with oil all around! Cover with plastic foil and let ferment until 1 1/2 swelled in size (about 1 hour).
Degas dough through kneading lightly and return to bowl again to go to sleep in the fridge overnight.

Dough:
2 1/3 cups (13 ounces) pate fermentee
2 2/3 cups (12 ounces) unbleached bread flour
1 tablespoon (.5 ounces) granulated sugar
1 teaspoon (.25 ounces) diastatic barley malt powder or 1 tablespoon (.75) barley malt syrup
1 teaspoon (.25 ounces) salt
1 teaspoon (.11 ounces) instant yeast
1 large (1.65 ounces) egg, lightly beaten
1 tablespoon (.5 ounces) unsalted butter or shortening at room temp, melted
3/4 cup plus 1 tablespoons (6-7 ounces) water, lukewarm

semolina flour or cornmeal for dusting

1. 1 hour before starting to make the bread: remove pate fermentee from fridge. Cut into 10 pieces. Cover with a towel or plastic wrap.

2. Flour, sugar, malt powder, salt and yeast go into the mixing bowl. Add pate fermentee pieces, egg, butter and 3/4 cups of water. Stir together until you have a nice ball. If your dough is rather firm or stiff, use a little more water, we want the dough to be soft at this stage.

3. Knead for about 10 minutes on floured counter or on your machine with dough hook on medium speed for 6 minutes. Add flour if needed to achieve a firm but elastic dough (tacky not sticky).
Transfer dough to lightly oiled bowl. Cover with plastic wrap. Ferment at room temp for two hours or until doubled in size.

4. When doubled in size, punch it down and return to bowl until dough doubles again.

5. Remove dough from bowl to counter and divide into 2 equal pieces for loaves. Or into 3 to 4 ounce pieces for pistolets (French split rolls). Shape larger pieces into boules (balls) and smaller ones into rolls. Mist the dough lightly with oil and cover loosely with plastic.

6. Leave to proof at room temp 60-90 minutes or until they have risen to approx. 1 3/4 of their original size.

7. Preheat your oven to 450°F and place an empty steam pan in your oven.
Just before baking mist the loaves or rolls with water and dust lightly with flour. Score loves and rolls down the center.

8. Slide loaves or rolls onto baking stone or baking tray. pour 1 cup water into your steam pan quickly close oven door. After 30 seconds open oven door and spray oven walls with water, close again. Repeat twice in 30 sec intervals. After final spray lower heat to 400°F for 10 minutes. Rotate breads 180° for even baking. Continue baking until breads are golden brown.

9. Remove breads or rolls from oven and let cool on rack for at least 45 minutes before slicing or serving.

Variety 1: "Dutch crunch topping" (or as we call it here Tiger bread or Tiger rolls)

Here is how:
Whisk together, 1 tablespoon bread flour, 3/4 cups rice flour, 3/4 teaspoon instant yeast, 2 teaspoons granulated sugar, 1/4 teaspoon salt, 2 teaspoons vegetable oil and 6-8 tablespoons water to make a paste.
If it seems too thin to spread without running off the top of the dough add more rice flour. It should be thick enough to spreed with a brush, but not so thick that it sits like a lump of mud. This makes enough for 2-4 loaves.

Variety 2: "Kaiser rolls".
The Kaiser roll, also called a Vienna roll or a hard roll (original name: Semmel or Kaisersemmel; if made by hand also: Handsemmel), is a kind of bread roll, supposedly invented in Vienna, and thought to have been named to honor Emperor Franz Joseph. It is a typically crusty round roll made from flour, barm, malt, water and salt, with the top side usually divided in a rotationally symmetric pattern of five segments, separated by curved superficial cuts radiating from the centre outwards. Kaiser rolls are often produced by machine, as well as by hand.(http://www.backrezepte-online.de/forum/viewtopic.php?t=2469 )

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Bread Baking Babes in Wenen

Waar zullen we eens heen gaan op vakantie... laten we naar Wenen gaan en onze fantastische Babe Astrid ontmoeten en meteen een lekker broodje bakken. Een Weens broodje natuurlijk, dat zij voor ons heeft uitgekozen. Weens brood, je kunt er alle kanten mee op. Een busbrood, bijv. met een tijgerkorst (da's pas echt Nederlands ontmoet Weens) of wat denk je van keizerbroodjes. Altijd een traktatie voor jong en oud. Ik heb een busbrood gemaakt met een tijgerkorst, iets te dik erop gesmeerd deze keer, maar desondanks prima van smaak. Ook heb ik wat bolletjes gemaakt -favoriet bij onze kinderen-. Astrid laat zien hoe 'makkelijk' je ze zelf kan vouwen, maar ik zat nogal in tijdnood en heb er één gevouwen (de voorste op de foto) en de rest met een 'stempel' voor keizerbroodjes een patroon gegeven. Ik ga zeker nog eens uitgebreid proberen ze mooi te vouwen met de hand, dat geeft toch wel wat extra effect.

Jullie willen vast en zeker dit heerlijke brood ook bakken, pak je bloem, bak, schiet een foto, blog en stuur je gegevens en resultaat via mail naar Astrid om een Bread Baking Buddy te worden! Deadline 29 augustus.

Weens brood
2 kleine broden of 9-12 broodjes

(recept PRINTEN)

Maak eerst de Pâte Fermentée (voor ongeveer 450 g)
280 g sterke bloem
3/4 tl zout
1/2 tl droge gist
175 g water

Meng zout, gist en bloem. Voeg het water toe meng dit met de k-garde in de standmixer tot het samenkomt. Kneed het verder met de deeghaak tot het een glad en elastisch deeg is, niet te plakkerig en niet te stijf. Leg het deel in een ingevette kom, dek af met plastic folie en laat het ongeveer een uur rijzen. Druk de lucht dan uit het deeg, leg het terug in de kom en zet het overnacht in de koelkast.

Deeg
370 g pate fermentee
340 g brood bloem (ik heb extra moeten gebruiken)
1 el suiker
1 tl moutpoeder of 1 el gerstemoutstroop
1 tl zout
1 tl droge gist
1 groot ei, licht geklutst
1 el ongezouten boter, gesmolten en afgekoeld naar kamertemperatuur
170-200 g lauwwarm water

semolina of maismeel om te bestuiven

1. 1 uur voordat je het brood gaat maken, haal je de pate fermentee uit de koelkast. Verdeel in 10 stukken en dek af met plastic. Laat het op kamertemperatuur komen.

2. Doe bloem, suiker, malt poeder, zout en gist in de mixerkom. Voeg de pate fermentee stukken erbij, het ei, boter, mout poeder, zout en gist en begin het deeg te kneden. Kneed ongeveer 10 minuten met de hand of 6 met de kneedhaak op medium snelheid. Voeg bloem toe als het deeg te nat is (ik heb ongeveer 100 g extra moeten bijvoegen). Het deeg moet glad en elastisch zijn en niet plakkerig.
Vorm het deeg tot een bal en leg het in een ingevette kom, dek af met plastic. Laat rijzen bij kamertemperatuur tot het verdubbeld is (ongeveer 2 uur).

3. Druk dan het deeg terug, en laat het nogmaals afgedekt in de kom rijzen.

4. Haal het deeg uit de kom en verdeel het in stukken. Twee voor grotere broden, 3 of 4 voor kleinere of in 9-12 stukken voor bolletjes. Bol de broden op of leg ze in een rol in een bakblik en dek af met ingevet plastic.

5. Laat het deeg rijzen tot ze ongeveer 1 3/4 van hun originele grootte hebben.

6. Verwarm de oven voor op 230ºC en zet een metalen bakje of pan onderin de oven.

7. Spray de broden vlak voor het bakken met water en bestrooi licht met semolina of maismeel. Snijd de broden/broodjes in het midden in..

8. Schuif de broden/broodjes op de baksteen. Giet een kopje water in de pan onderin de oven en sluit snel de deur. Na 30 seconden nogmaals in de oven sprayen met water. Doe dit een paar keer. Bak dan de broden verder op 200ºc. Draai de broden halverwege om voor een gelijkmatig bakresultaat. Bak tot de gaar en goudbruin zijn.

Laat de broden op een rooster afkoelen.

Variatie 1: Tijgerbrood/tijgerbolletjes.
Meng 1 el bloem, 110 g rijstmeel, ¾ tl droge gist, 2 tl suiker, ¼ tl zout, 2 el plantaardige olie en 6-8 el water om een papje te maken. Het moet dik genoeg zijn zodat het niet van het brood afloopt en dun genoeg om uit te kunnen smeren over de bovenkant van het brood. Deze hoeveelheid is genoeg voor 2 tot 4 broden.

Variatie 2: "Keizerbroodjes"
Een wit bolletje dat ookwel Weens broodje wordt genoemd. Te herkennen aan het patroon aan de bovenkant: 5 segmenten. Je kunt dit maken door het broodje met een speciale keizerbroodjes-stempel in te drukken of door het met de hand te vouwen. Hoe dat moet staat hier: http://www.backrezepte-online.de/forum/viewtopic.php?t=2469

Mellow Bakers in August

2011-08-11T17:15:00.039+02:00

And another episode of the Mellow Bakers Challenge. Here are the breads made for this August edition. We're really getting this thing done... I wonder how many more month there are for us to bake. Let's have a look at the August's breads first:

Oatmeal Bread. As you can see in the picture, I've baked this one in 2006, quite a while ago. I just had one note that I wrote down in the book (as I do in all my baking/cooking books) and it says: "Looks real pretty". And so it does!

Oatmeal bread with cinnamon and raisins. Looks quite different, because of the cinnamon that has given the crumb a brown colour.

Focaccia. Delicious! Look at that crumb, really nice, just rosemary and some salt.... what else do you need?! I'll bake this one again for sure.

Focaccia con formaggio, not my favorite I must say. I love ricotta, but in this bread I thought it wasn't as good. I think I'd like it better with another kind of cheese in between, a stronger one perhaps and maybe not so much of it. Some mozzarella with basil, Parmigiano Reggiano with rosemary... you name it.

Black bread. This one we didn't like, I guess it was the coffee. Even though it was soaked, it still was grainy in the bread and too much of it as well.

So those were the breads for this months Mellow Bakers. I'll be back with more next month....

Bread Baking Day # 42; going on a picnic

2011-07-27T10:23:00.000+02:00

This month a wonderful theme for the Bread Baking Day event, originally initiated by Zorra. Our hostess for this month Palmira ("Come conmigo, el blog de Palmira") choose "bread for a picnic", a wonderful summery theme.... well at least that's what it should have been. But it still hasn't become summer here, just rain, rain, rain.... So there's no option left to make believe there's sun, we're sitting outside on the grass and enjoying a picnic.

Bread for a picnic for me is something you can eat out of your hand (no cutlery) and preferably all in one-ready to eat, without having to do something to it on the spot. Somehow savory breads/rolls give me more the picnic-feel than sweet ones. So these are savory, they don't only smell like an Italian summer, but they're really delicious (even though we had to eat them inside). Well we just have to wait for the sun to finally show herself and we can bake these again!!! Thanks Palmira for this wonderful choice. I can't wait to see what kinds of breads have been baked to inspire our summers.

Pesto, tomato and pine nut bread
(about 12 pieces)

(PRINT recipe)

475 g bread flour
1 tsp salt
2 tsp sugar
1 ¼ tsp dry yeast
1 tsp olive oil (p.e. from the jar of the sundried tomatoes)
2 heaped TBsp pesto
± 275 g lukewarm water
75 g sun-dried tomatoes in oil, drained and sliced
3 TBsp pine nuts
1 egg yolk (to glaze)

Knead together the flour, salt, sugar, yeast with the oil,water and pesto until the dough is smooth and elastic. You can do this by hand or with the dough hook of your standmixer on medium speed. Take the dough out and press it flat, divide the dried tomato pieces on it, roll up the dough and knead the tomato pieces and 2 TBsp pine nuts in with care. Shape into a ball.
Place in a greased bowl and cover with plastic. Let it rise until doubled.

Grease a rectangle (8 x 10”) or round (9”) baking tin. Degas the dough and place it in the tin, press it well into the corners. Cover with greased plastic and let rise until doubled.
Preheat the oven to 400ºF/200ºC.

Carefully brush with egg yolk and sprinkle with the remaining pine nuts. Bake for 25-30 minutes until golden and done. Take it out to cool on a wire rack.

(adapted from “The bread book” - Sara Lewis)

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Bread Baking Day nr. 42: Picknicken

Deze maand een heerlijk thema for het Bread Baking Day event, gestart door Zorra. Onze gastvrouw van deze maand Palmira ("Come conmigo, el blog de Palmira") koos "Picknick Brood", een perfect zomers thema... tenmiste dat had het moeten zijn. Maar de Nederlands zomer is nog steeds erg nat. Dus moeten we wel net doen alsof de zon schijnt, we buiten in het gras zitten en genieten van een picknick.

Voor mij moet een picknickbrood voldoen aan een aantal eisen. Het moet te eten zijn zonder mes en vork, het liefst kant-en-klaar, zodat je er ter plekke niet meer aan of op hoeft te smeren en -hoewel ik dol ben op zoet- komen hartige broodjes eerder aan bod dan zoete.

Dus hier zijn hartige, naar Italiaanse zomer ruikende broodjes. Superlekker en de zon moeten we er maar even bij denken. En kan je ze niet buiten eten... dan maar binnen. De zon is onderweg....

Pesto-tomaat brood met pijnboompitten
(ongeveer 12 porties)

(recept PRINTEN)

475 g brood bloem
1 tl zout
2 tl suiker
1 ¼ tl droge gist
1 tl olijfolie (bijv. de olie waar de tomaten in hebben gezeten)
2 volle eetl. pesto
± 275 g lauw water
75 g zon gedroogde tomaten op olie, uitgelekt en in reepjes
3 el pijnboompitten
1 eidooier (om te bestrijken)

Doe de bloem, zout, suiker, gist in een kom, voeg de oilie, pesto en water erbij en kneed tot het deeg glad en elastisch is (stel bij met extra water of bloem indien nodig). Je kan dit met de hand doen of m.b.v. de kneedhaak en je standmixer.

Haal het deeg eruit, druk het plat, verdeel de tomaat en 2 el pijnboompitten erover, rol het op en werk ze dan voorzichtig (om de tomaten niet stuk te maken) door het deeg. Vorm het deeg tto een bal. Leg in een ingevette kom, dek af met plastic en laat rijzen tot het verdubbeld is.

Vet een rechthoekige (20 x 25 cm) of een ronde (23 cm) bakvorm in. Druk het deeg erin en duw het goed in de hoeken. Dek af met ingevet plastic en laat het rijzen tot het verdubbeld is
Verwarm de oven voor 200ºC.

Bestrijk het deeg dan voorzichtig met het licht geklutste eigeel (eventueel met een eetlepel water) en bestrooi het met de overgebleven pijnboompitten. Bak het brood 25-30 minuten tot het goudbruin en gaar is. Laat het dan op een rooster afkoelen.

(bewerkt naar “The bread book” - Sara Lewis)

Mellow Bakers in July

2011-07-24T13:17:00.000+02:00

Here are the breads for the July edition of the Mellow Bakers Challenge (Baking our way through Jeffrey Hamelman's "Bread"). We've baked quite a lot in the meantime, just a 1/4 to go! I've baked all so far, didn't miss one yet. Here a display of this month's breads. Enjoy.

The Olive Levain, a wonderful rustic bread. Nice holes too. As only the kids here are fond of olives, they happily ate the lot. I worked the olives in by hand, didn't want to get them broken up in the dough. It's a good idea to make this at the end of the day, so it can rest overnight in the fridge.

The Potato bread with roasted onions is totally delicious. I roasted the onions long and slow on low heat until very brown and sweet. They turned the whole loaf brown. I really love this 'fendu'-style, although mine wasn't as fendu-ish as I would have liked, better practise some more with it. Great bread to eat with cheeses.

Sourdough rye with raisins and walnuts. Wonderful bread, I just love nuts and raisins in a a bread. I had to make the 'medium rye flour' by mixing 50% whole rye flour and 50% white rye flour together, as they don't sell it here. With a bit of yeast in the dough to help it along and lessen the tangy flavour a great bread!

And with these baked we've baked 3/4 of the book! That's a lot of bread. See you next month with some new breads...... to be continued.

The taste of whole wheat

2011-07-23T12:03:00.007+02:00

This bread recipe comes from the Hartog bakery in Amsterdam. Aagje Hartog baked bread for visitors from Amsterdam at the end of the 19th century, and this was such a succes that they pursuaded her to start baking in Amsterdam. Starting small, the bakery got bigger and bigger and with two shops still holding on to their philosofy only to use whole grain.

They buy the whole grain and mill that into flour in their own bakery, so the flour is fresh and full of all their goodness. They bake all their products with just whole flour and people are queueing to buy bread there. There is even a whole wheat

'oliebol'-recipe developed, that draws people in from all over (we eat 'oliebollen' in Holland at the end of the year). Too bad I don't live closer to Amsterdam!

This bread has lots of sunflower seeds, only whole wheat flour and it's delicious and moist. I have baked it over and over again and is always a succes. Of course you can knead it by hand as well, you can see it on video here (but if you're used to that you'll know how). Enjoy and stay healthy :).

I also submit this bread to Susan's Wild Yeast "Yeastspotting" a weekly freshly baked tray of breads.

Sunflower seed bread

(1 loaf)

(PRINT recipe)

400 g whole wheat flour

80 g sunflower seeds

10 g pine nuts

20 g sesame seeds

10 g salt

300 ml cold water

2,5 tsp dry yeast (or 30 g fresh)

for coating: 150 g sunflower seeds

Stir the seeds, nuts, yeast and salt in the whole wheat flour in a large mixing bowl. Start mixing on low with the dough hook while adding the water (you may use less or more depending on your flour). Put the speed on medium and mix the dough for at least 10 minutes. The dough should be sticky (not dry to the touch). Shape into a ball, place in a greased bowl and cover. Let the dough rise for 30-45 minutes until ⅓ increase in volume.

Push the dough down, reshape into a ball, place in a greased bowl and cover. Let it rise again for 30-45 minutes. Grease a 9 x 5 inch loafpan.

Flatten the dough and roll up into a tight log. Spread the sunflowerseeds on a surface, lightly moisten the log and roll the log in the seeds. Place seemside down in the baking tin.

Cover with greased plastic and let rise until doubled.

Preheat the oven to 220ºC.

Lower the oven temperature to 200ºC and bake the loaf for 30/40 minutes until done. Take the bread out of the tin and let cool on a wire rack. When you knock on the bottom of the bread it should sound hollow.

(source: “Volkorenbrood.nl” - N. Willemse)

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De smaak van volkoren

(Foto van Hartog's)

Dit is een recept van Hartog's volkoren bakkerij uit Amsterdam. Klein begonnen aan het eind van de 19e eeuw is het familiebedrijf langzaam groter geworden en nu zijn er twee winkels in Amsterdam. Al het graan wordt in de bakkerij gemalen, zodat het meel vers is en alle goedheid er nog in zit. Voor hun bakkerijproducten wordt alleen volkorenmeel gebruikt. En er is zelfs een volkoren oliebol ontwikkelt die rond oud en nieuw mensen van heinde en verre aantrekt en in de lange rij wachten tot ze aan de beurt zijn.

Dit brood bak ik ondertussen regelmatig en valt altijd in de smaak. Ik heb het hier opgeschreven om met de kneedhaak van de standmixer te maken, wil je het liever met de hand doen, dan kan je dat hier (met nog wat andere recepten) en hier vinden. Geniet van de heerlijke smaak van volkoren!!

Zonnebloempittenbrood
(1 brood)

(recept PRINTEN)

400 g volkorenmeel
80 g zonnebloempitten
10 g pijnboompitten
20 g sesamzaad
10 g zout
300 ml koud water
2,5 tl droge gist (of 30 g verse)
deocratie: 150 g zonnebloempitten

Meng het volkorenmeel, pitten, zaad, gist en zout in de kom van een standmixer. Begin op een lage snelheid te kneden met de kneedhaak terwijl je water toevoegd (afhankelijk van het meel kan je iets meer of minder nodig hebben). Als al het meel is opgenomen, verhoog je de kneedsnelheid naar medium en kneed het deeg tenminste 10 minuten. Het deeg voelt als het goed is nog light plakkerig. Vorm het tot een bal, leg in een ingevette kom en dek af. Laat het deeg 30-45 minuten rijzen.

Duw het deeg terug, vorm het weer tot bal en dek af. Laat het nogmaals 30-45 minuten rijzen. Vet een broodblik in.

Druk het deeg plat op een licht ingevet werkoppervlak en rol het dan op tot een rol met de lengte van het bakblik.
Leg de zonnepitten op het werkvlak, maak het brood licht vochtig en rol/druk het door de zonnepitten. Leg het deeg dan met de naad naar beneden in het blik. Dek af met ingevet plastic en laat het rijzen tot verdubbeld.
(Je kunt testen of het genoeg gerezen heeft door er met een vinger in de drukken, veert het deeg meteen terug, is het nog niet helemaal zover. Als de deuk erin blijft, kan het in de oven)

Verwarm de oven voor op 220ºC.

Zet het brood in de oven, verlaag de temperatuur tot 200ºC en bak het brood ongeveeer 30-40 minuten tot het gaar is. Haal het brood uit de vorm en laat het afkoelen op een rooster. Het brood klinkt hol als je er aan de onderkant op klopt en het gaar is. .

(bewerkt naar: “Volkorenbrood.nl” - N. Willemse)

Bread Baking Babes Buns

2011-07-16T21:47:00.003+02:00

Our lovely babe Sara ("I like to cook") put hamburgers on the menu this month. A wonderful idea to celebrate summer. The day is almost over.. I baked the buns yesterday late, was so tired, but dragged myself to the kitchen to make them. We just ate them for dinner and I'm quickly writing up this post to still be on time. It's quite a different recipe than I'm familiar with for hamburger buns. First of all they are square, I never made a square bun for a hamburger. Yeah I know I could have made them round, but I think it's fun just to make them like this. They turned out good, but I think I'd use less yeast, less salt, less sugar next time. I used a little less sugar and salt already, but still the buns were a little too sweet for a burger to my taste. I thought about using less yeast as well, but as there was a lot of melted butter involved, I thought it might still need the yeast in the end. It rose a bit too fast, just caught it in time. I have better control over the dough when there is less yeast in it. Just a shame that the weather didn't behave more summery, so we could eat the hamburgers outside in the sun. Instead we had pouring rain and the light on at the table indoors.

But there will be better days ahead, can't rain all the time. So bake, post and send over your results to Sara and become a Bread Baking Buddy. Deadline 29th of this month.

Hamburger Buns
(makes 12 buns)

(PRINT recipe)

1 1/2 cups (375 ml) milk
8 Tbs (1stick/125 g) unsalted butter, cut into 8 pieces
4 1/2 tsp active dry yeast
4 cups (625 g) all purpose flour, plus more for dusting
5 Tbs sugar
1 Tbs kosher salt
1 egg beaten with 1 tsp water
sesame seeds for sprinkling (optional)

In a small saucepan over medium heat, combine the milk and butter and heat until the butter is melted, about 7 minutes. Remove from the heat and let cool to 105-155º (40 to 46ºC). Add the yeast and stir until the yeast is dissolved. Let stand for 10 minutes.

In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the dough hook, combine the 4 cups of flour, the sugar and salt and beat on low speed until combined, about 30 seconds. Add the milk mixture and knead for 1 minute. Increase the speed to medium low and knead until the dough is smooth and elastic, 4 to 5 minutes. Place the dough in a greased bowl, cover and let the dough rise in a warm place until doubled in volume, about 1 hour.

Line a baking sheet with parchment paper. On a lightly floured work surface, roll out the dough into a 10 by 7 1/2 inch (25 by 19 cm) rectangle. Cut the dough into 2 1/2 inch (6cm) squares. Place the buns on a prepared baking sheet, spacing the buns evenly apart, and cover t.with plastic wrap. Let rise in a warm place for 30 minutes. Preheat oven to 400ºF (200ºC)

Remove the plastic wrap from the baking sheet. Brush the tops of the buns with the egg mixture and sprinkle with sesame seeds. Bake until the buns are golden 14 to 16 minutes. Transfer the buns to a wire rack and let cool. Cut in half and use as hamburger buns. Makes 12.

For slider buns: Follow the instructions above but roll out the dough into a 9 inch (23 cm) square. Cut into 1 1/2 inch (4cm) squares and place on 2 parchment lined baking sheets. Cover tightly with plastic wrap and let rise in a warm place for 30 minutes. Position one rack in the upper third of an over and one rack in the lower third and preheat to 400ºF (200ºC). Brush the tops with the egg mixture and sprinkle with sesame seeds if using. Bake for about 14 minutes. Makes 36 slider buns.

(recipe by: Williams-Sonoma)

4 years "Bread Baking Day" (#41)

2011-07-01T21:39:00.005+02:00

Happy anniversary Bread Baking Day. It's been four years since initiater Zorra started this event and it's been a great event from day one for all bread bakers around the world. Quite a populair event too and rightly so, one of my favorites. I haven't baked each and every month, but a quick count told me that I've managed to bake 33 times for the Bread Baking Day. This month the event is hosted by Connie ("My discovery of bread") and she asked us to make Bread with herbs. I'm afraid I haven't been very adventurous with herbs in this bread... as a matter of fact, there aren't a lot of them in the bread. But as this month sort of slipped between my fingers and the 31th of June didn't exist, I've been baking yesterday and quickly writing this up today. So no time to bake something else.

And even though it may not be a very 'herby' bread, it really is delicious almost cakelike. A sweet bread with raisins, lemon and rosemary. You could give it a glaze made with icing sugar and lemonjuice to drizzle on top, but for me that didn't needed it at all. A real festive bread, so to many more Bread Baking Days!!! Hip Hip

Rosemary-Lemon bread
(1 loaf)

(PRINT recipe)

60 g blanched and toasted hazelnuts, chopped
155 ml milk
1 large egg
30 g soft butter
40 g honey
385 g bread flour
4 tsp chopped fresh rosemary
grated zest of 1 lemon
1 tsp salt
2 tsp dry yeast
130 g golden raisins

Roast the hazelnuts until golden, let cool and chop.

Place all ingredients, except the nuts and raisins, in a bowl and knead with the dough hook until it’s smooth and elastic (about 10 minutes). Let rest for 10 minutes. Knead the nuts and raisins in by hand. Shape into a ball, place in a greased bowl, cover with plastic and let rise for about 1 hour in a warm spot.

Grease a bread tin. Take the dough out, press it flat and roll it into a log. Place seem side down in the tin, cover with greased plastic and let rise until doubled.

In the meantime preheat the oven to 200ºC. Slash the bread lengthwise. Bake with steam for about 40 minutes. Check if the inside is baked through, a thermometer stuck in the bread should read about 93ºC..
Leave to cool on a wire rack.

(adapted from “The breadlover’s breadmachine cookbook” - Beth Hensperger)

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4 Jaar Bread Baking Day (nr.41)

Alweer vier jaar houdt het blog-event Bread Baking Day zich staande. Gestart door Zorra en een geweldig leuk event voor broodbakliefhebbers. Bijna elke maand een ander thema en -even snel nagekeken- ik heb er de afgelopen jaren 33 keer aan meegebakken. Deze keer is het thema Brood met kruiden. Echt vol met kruiden zit mijn brood niet. Er zit wat rozemarijn in, maar het is toch de citroen die de boventoon voert. Maar goed het was even een haastklus zo op de laatste dag, dus ook al zit er niet zo veel rozemarijn in is dit toch mijn inzending voor deze maand. Je kunt ook nog een suikerglazuur over het brood doen na het bakken (met poedersuiker en citroensap), maar eerlijk gezegd is het brood zo lekker dat het eigenlijk verder niets nodig heeft.

Rozemarijn-Citroenbrood
(1 brood)

(recept PRINTEN)

60 g hazelnoten zonder vlies

155 ml melk
1 groot ei
30 g zachte (ongezouten boter)
40 g honing
385 g brood bloem
4 tl verse rozemarijnblaadjes, gehakt
geraspte schil van 1 citroen
1 tl zout
2 tl droge gist
130 g gele rozijnen

Rooster de hazelnoten tot ze goudbruin zijn, laat ze afkoelen en hak ze.

Doe alle ingrediënten, behalve de noten en rozijnen, in een mixerkom en kneed het deeg met de deeghaak tot het glad en elastisch is (ongeveer 10 minuten). Laat het 10 minuten rusten. Kneed de rozijnen en noten erdoor met de hand. Vorm tot een bal, leg in een ingevette, afgedekte kom en laat het 1 uur rijzen op een warme plek.

Vet een broodblik in.
Druk het deeg plat en vorm het tot een rol en leg het met de naad naar beneden in het bakblik. Dek af met ingevet plastic en laat rijzen tot het verdubbeld is.

Verwarm de oven voor op 200ºC.

Snijd het brood ondiep in in de lengte. Bak met stoom ongeveer 40 minuten.. Controleer met een kernthermometer of het brood gaar is (93ºC).
Laat het brood afkoelen op een rooster voor je het aansnijdt.

(bewerkt naar “The breadlover’s breadmachine cookbook” - Beth Hensperger)

Bread Baking Babes without yeast

2011-06-16T13:43:00.000+02:00

)This month I thought it would be easy peasy. Quick bread without yeast, rising or kneading. Our super-talented babe Ilva ("Lucullian delights") choose to bake a soda bread, so she could manage to bake for this month even with her busy schedule. I have baked soda bread before (like the one for the mellow baker challenge) and somehow I just can't find myself becoming a fan. This time the bread looked good, was moist and full of lovely herbs... but (yeah there is the ''but") it just had an offensive smell. We ate a few slices (with our noses pinched) and the taste was not too bad. But that smell, just awful, even worse the day after baking, so I binned the rest.

We tried to think of answers why... as I'm the only one so far that has this problem... but not really sure. It may be the baking soda that tastes/smells/reacts different from one brand to another. Although I never have smelled/tasted anything peculiar when used in baked goods like cakes ecc. Maybe I'll give it another go when I can find a different brand baking soda.

Don't let it put you off becoming a Bread Baking Buddy, as I'm the only one that screwed up. Have a look at the soda breads from the other Babes (links in the side bar) to see how it's really done. Bake, post and send it to Ilva so she can make a Bread Baking Buddy Round-up! (Deadline June 29).

White Soda Bread with Herbs
(1 loaf)

(PRINT recipe)

450 g plain white four

1 level tsp salt

1 level tsp bread soda, finely sieved

1 dessert spoon each of rosemary, sage and chives, all freshly chopped

400 ml buttermilk

Heat up the oven to 230ºC/450ºF

Sieve the flour, salt and bread soda into a large, wide mixing bowl. Add the freshly chopped herbs to the dry ingredients.

Make a well in the centre. Pour most of the milk into the flour. Using one hand with the fingers open and stiff, mix in a full circle drawing in the flour from the sides of the bowl, adding more milk if necessary. The dough should be softish, not too wet and sticky.

The trick with all soda breads is not to over-mix the dough. Mix the dough as quickly and as gently as possible, keeping it really light and airy. When the dough comes together, turn it out onto a well-floured work surface. Wash and dry your hands.

Gently roll the ball of dough around with floury hands for a few seconds, just enough to tidy up. Then pat it gently into a round, about 5 cm/2 in high.

Place the dough on a lightly floured baking sheet. With a sharp knife cut a deep cross in the middle of it, letting the cuts go over the sides of the bread. Then prick the four triangles with your knife: according to Irish folklore this will let the fairies out!

Put this into your preheated oven for 10 minutes, then turn the heat down to 200ºC/400ºF for a further 25 minutes, or until cooked. When the bread is cooked it will sound hollow when tapped.

(from The Ballymaloe Bread Book by Tim Allen)

Mellow Bakers in June

2011-06-07T10:01:00.001+02:00

A new month, a new set of breads for the Mellow Bakers Challenge (baking our way throught Jeffrey Hamelman's book "Bread"). Breads with very different characters this time. Let's take a look

1. Pain Rustique.

Take a look and what does it remind you off? Yes of course:Ciabatta. I think it's just the French version of ciabatta. Comparing this recipe and the one for ciabatta with poolish, almost twins, the ciabatta has a few percent more liquid, but that's hardly a difference. It's a good bread, holes and everything, so this one got a good mark.

2. Semolina Bread.

Now we really move to Italy with this one, such lovely fragrant and slightly yellow bread. I added more water, but that can happen as flours vary in the way they slurp up the water. A very short sponge, so that's handy too for the people that are not always reading the recipe the day before they want to start baking. Lovely bread.

3. Volkornbrot & Volkornbrot with flaxseeds.

As this kind of bread is only eaten by my husband and I still wanted to bake both of them, I halved the recipe and placed both of them next to eachother in the pullman pan. All in all I guess it turned out like it is supposed to look. Sort of square and dense. Sour smell and taste and probably very good for you. So I was happy with the result, as I admit I'm a bit scared baking these kinds of breads. I let it rest, wrapped in a tea towel, for a little over 24 hours before slicing and that went well. Sliced thinly and packed 4 in a bag, they were all frozen and by now (as I baked this a few months back) they are all eaten by our "roggenbrood" (= dutch for "volkornbrot")-lover. Yay for him too!

This was a very divers baking month and with all good results. Looking forward in seeing the other breads on the participants blogs and finding out what we'll be baking next month for the Mellow Bakers!

Bread Baking Day #40

2011-05-31T09:19:00.000+02:00

Last day of the month..you know what that means: Baking for the Bread Baking Day event. Initiated by Zorra and hosted by her as well this month. I really love this event, as it makes you bake things that you weren't considering otherwise and then when all the breads are baked, you're inspired by all the possibilities and breads others have baked shown in the round-up. So even though this being a very busy month with both kids having their birthdays, me doing an evening course with lots of homework, I'm glad I've managed to find time to bake. "Bread with curd" is the theme. I bought some quarck for this event, not yet knowing what to bake. Then I spotted a lovely recipe using Cottage Cheese, so I bought some, we ate the quarck and I made these lovely fragrant rolls. You can add the chopped shallot in raw as well, but sautéd they are better I think. Your whole kitchen will smell like heaven. The rolls are very soft and velvety and taste very good too. Highly recommendable!

Cottage cheese dill rolls

(12 rolls)

(PRINT recipe)

2 TBsp olive oil
1 medium shallot, chopped

240 g cottage cheese
60 ml milk
1 large egg
1 egg yolk
350 g bread flour
1 TBsp sugar
2 TBsp dried dill weed
1 TBsp salt
2 tsp dry active yeast

Heat the oil in a small skillet, add the chopped challot and sauté until translucent with light golden brown edges. Set aside too cool.

You can make the dough by placing all the ingredients in your bread machine (order according to your machine’s instructrions) and use the “dough” programm.
Or make the dough by kneading it by hand or in the spiral mixer until you get a souple and soft dough. Place it in a greased bowl, cover with plastic and let rise until doubled.

Divide the dough in 12 equal parts and roll them into little balls. Place on a baking sheet with baking parchment and cover with greased plastic plastic. Let them rise until doubled, depending on the temperature they’re in about 1 hour.

In the mean time preheat the oven to 400ºF/200ºC.
Snip the rolls with a scissor on top (crosswise). Bake the rolls for about 15-20 minutes until they’re starting to colour golden on top. Leave them to cool on a wire rack.

(adapted from “The bread lover’s bread machine cookbook” - Beth Hensperger)

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Bread Baking Day nr. 40

Laatste dag van de maand en dus tijd voor een aflevering van de Bread Baking Day. Dit brood-bak-event dat opgezet is door Zorra, wordt deze keer ook door haar verzorgd. Zorra koos het thema "bread with curd", tja letterlijk vertaald is dat brood met stremsel, maar dat klinkt wel erg vreemd. Ze bedoelt ermee brood met dingen zoals kwark, hüttenkäse en dergelijke. Ik had kwark gekocht, maar kwam daarna een recept met hüttenkäse tegen (waarom gebruiken we daar eigenlijk altijd een Duitse term voor?...nou ja, waarschijnlijk omdat "huisjeskaas" voor geen meter klinkt). En dat leek me zo'n lekker recept dat we de kwark maar gewoon opgegeten hebben.

Je kunt eventueel ook rauwe uitjes in het deeg doen, maar zo even aangefruit vind ik het toch lekkerder. De broodjes zijn fluweelzacht, ze ruiken echt heel erg lekker...en smaken ook verrukkelijk. De hele keuken geurde ernaar. Echt een aanrader.

Bolletjes met Hüttenkäse en dille
(12 bolletjes)

(recept PRINTEN)

2 el olijfolie
1 medium sjalot, gehakt

240 g Hüttenkäse (cottage cheese)
60 ml melk
1 groot ei
1 eidooier
350 g sterke bloem
1 el suiker
2 el gedroogde dille
1 tl zout
2 tl droge gist

Verwarm de olie in een klein pannetje, voeg de gehakte sjalot toe en fruit deze zachtjes aan tot ze doorzichtig en lichtbruin aan de randjes zijn. Haal van het vuur en laat afkoelen.

Je kunt het deeg eenvoudig in de broodbakmachine maken (“deeg” stand), doe de ingrediënten er in de volgorde in die je normaal ook gebruikt. Natte of droge ingrediënten eerst). Na de “piep” verder gaan met het verdelen van het deeg in 12 stukken zoals hieronder beschreven staat.

Of maak het deeg met de planetaire mixer, door de deegingrediënten bij elkaar te doen en te kneden tot je een soepel en zacht deeg hebt, eventueel corrigeren met wat extra bloem of water). Laat het afgedekt in een ingevette kom rijzen tot het ongeveer verdubbeld is.

Verdeel het deeg dan in 12 gelijke delen, rol er bolletjes van en plaats die op bakpapier op een bakplaat. Dek af met ingevet plastic en laat ze rijzen tot ze ongeveer verdubbeld zijn.

Verwarm ondertussen de oven voor op 200ºC.
Knip de bovenkant van de bolletjes kruisgewijs in met een schaar, niet te diep. Bak de bolletjes ongeveer 15-20 minuten tot ze licht goudbruin beginnen te kleuren. Laat ze op een rooster afkoelen.

(bewerkt naar “The bread lover’s bread machine cookbook” - Beth Hensperger)

Bread Baking Babes bake a vulcano.... well sort of

2011-05-16T10:19:00.000+02:00

This month a wonderful, delicious and mouthwatering recipe chosen by Elle ("Feeding my enthousiasts") who's kitchen is kitchen of the month of May. She found the recipe on Heather's blog "Girlichef". Thanks Heather.

An Italian inspired bread called Stromboli. Stromboli is a small vulcanic Italian island and the bread 'resembles' a vulcano, because its cheesy filling bubbles out of the holes that you pierce in the bread before baking. You can vary the filling, but cheese is sort of obligated :). I made a large Stromboli with cheese, herbs and meat and a little one omitting the cheese for our son (milk-allergy), so you can adjust to your own taste (and what's in your fridge). We ate the whole bread for dinner .. yes all of it, just the four of us.. and yes, it's soooo good!

Bring summer to your home and get the Italian spheres at home, bake, post and send your details to the kitchen of the month (deadline 29th of the month as usual) and most of all enjoy this wonderful tasty and fragant loaf!!!

Stromboli

(1 large bread)

(PRINT recipe)

2 tsp. dry yeast (1 packet dry yeast)
1 ¼ c. water (268 grams)
3 ½ c. unbleached flour (470 grams)
1 ½ tsp. salt (11 grams)
3 Tbs. olive oil (38 grams)

For the filling and topping: (To your own taste, this is just an example)
8 oz. smoked swiss cheese (226 grams)
3 cloves garlic, minced
8 oz. Prosciutto, sliced thin (226 grams)
4 oz. pepperoni, sliced thin (113 grams)
Handful of fresh basil leaves
1 tsp. coarse salt

3 sprigs rosemary, stems removed
1 tsp. freshly ground black pepper

Sprinkle yeast into 1 c. of the water, in small bowl. Leave for 5 minutes to then stir to dissolve.
Mix the flour and salt in a large bowl. Make a well in center and pour in dissolved yeast and the oil. Mix in flour from sides of well. Stir in reserved water, as needed, to form a soft, sticky dough.

Turn dough out onto a lightly floured surface. Knead until smooth, silky, and elastic...~10 mins. Pour dough in a clean, oiled bowl and cover with clean kitchen towel. Let rise until doubled in size, 1,5 - 2 hours.

Punch down and chafe* for 5 minutes. Let rest 10 minutes.
Shape into a 14" x 8" rectangle. Cover w/ clean towel and let rest another 10 minutes.

Spread your cheeses, meats, garlic and basil evenly over dough. Roll up the dough like a swiss roll, starting at one of the shorter sides, but without rolling too tightly. Place on oiled baking sheet. Use a skewer or a carving fork to pierce several holes through the dough to the baking sheet. Sprinkle with 1 Tbs. of olive oil, salt, rosemary and pepper.

Bake in preheated (400ºF) oven for 1 hour, until golden. Drizzle remaining olive oil over top. Slice and serve!!

(adapted from Ultimate Bread by Eric Treuille & Ursula Ferrigno)

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Bread Baking Babes bakken een vulkaan... nou ja zoiets dan

Deze maand een verrukkelijk brood dat Elle ("Feeding my enthousiasts") deze maand voor ons uitgekozen heeft. Ze vond het recept op Heather´s blog "Girlichef". Een Italiaans geìnspireerd brood met de naam Stromboli. Stromboli is een klein Italiaans vulkanisch eiland en het brood doet aan een vulkaan denken doordat de gesmolten kaas tijdens het bakken uit de gaten bubbelt die voor het bakken in het brood worden geprikt. Je kunt de vulling variëren, maar kaas is toch eigenlijk wel essentieel.

Ik heb een grote Stromboli gemaakt en een mini versie waar ik de kaas heb weggelaten (voor onze melkallergische zoon), dus vul hem lekker zoals je zelf wilt zou ik zeggen en wat je koelkast je te bieden heeft. We hebben het hele brood soldaat gemaakt als diner... ja helemaal, met ons vieren; zo lekker was het gewoon!

Breng de Italiaanse zomer bij je thuis, bak, blog en stuur je gegevens naar de keuken van de maand om een Bread Baking Buddy te worden (dfeadline 29e van de maand zoals gewoonlijk) en bovenal geniet van dit heerlijk brood!!

Stromboli

(1 groot brood)

(recept PRINTEN)

Deeg
2 tl droge gist
270 g water
470 g sterke bloem
1 tl zout
3 el olijfolie

Vulling (Naar je eigen smaak, dit is wat ik gebruikte)
1 bol buffelmozzarella
een paar plakjes jonge Goudse kaas
1 knoflookteen, fijn gehakt
6 plakken runderrookvlees
20 basilicumblaadjes
3 el pesto

2 takjes rozemarijn
peper

Meng bloem en zout in een kom, meng in een kuiltje in het midden 200 ml water met de gist. Meng dan langzaam de bloem erdoor. Gebruik genoeg van het resterende water om een zacht, maar plakkerig deeg te krijgen. Kneed het tot een zacht, glad en elastich deeg, min. 10 minuten..
Plaats het deeg in een bal in een ingevette kom, dek af en laat 1,5 - 2 uur rijzen.

Druk de lucht eruit en laat het 10 minuten rusten. Vorm er een rechthoek van (op een licht ingevette werkoppervlak) van ongeveer 20 x 30 cm. Dek af met ingevet plastic en laat nogmaals 10 minuten rusten.

Verdeel de vulling over het deeg (je kunt de rozemarijn ook op het brood gebruiken). Rol het deeg op aan de korte kant en maak de naad goed vast. Leg het brood met de naad naar beneden op en met bakpapier bekleedde bakplaat. Steek met een lang dun mes of een spies in het deeg. Bestrijk het deeg met wat olijfolie en steek de rozemarijn her en der in het deeg. Strooi wat peper erover.

Bak in een voorverwarmde oven (200ºC) tot het brood goudbruin is (ongeveer 45 minuten). Laat afkoelen tot lauw, snijd voorzichtig aan en serveer.

(bewerkt naar “Bread” - Eric Treuille & Ursula Ferrigno)

Mellow Bakers in May

2011-05-03T13:40:00.001+02:00

Again I'm early this month with the display of the breads of the month May for the Mellow Bakers Challenge. It's easier now for me to be early, because to be honest... I've baked them all already at this point. I guess I'm not very good at taking it slow when a task lays ahead of me. But I'll shower the breads onto you all month by month so you don't get to many carbs ;).

The Five grain bread with pâte fermentée is one of my favorites, I've baked this one already in 2006 and drew 5 stars next to the recipe. As said before the use of a soaker like this is a thing I use more often since this book, great way of incorporating texture, fibers and vitamins. Wonderful rustic bread, also very good as rolls!

The Pissaladière was OK. We're just no real anchovies fans, way too salty for our tastes, even though I cut the filets in as small stripes as I could. The dough is good, nothing very special, but good. We ate it, the kids divided the olives between them and we took about half of the anchovies slithers off.

Also a very good loaf was the Roasted hazelnut and prune bread. I love these breads with added flavour. Don't omit the toasting of the nuts, that really gives a wonderful flavor. I left the prunes in fairly big pieces.

That was it for this Mellow Bakers month, see you next month.

Easter stollen

2011-04-24T12:11:00.004+02:00

Of course we all know the Stollen we make and eat around Christmas time, funny thing is we have the same stollen here at Easter, but then we call it Easter stollen, and again at Pentecost calling it... yes you guessed right: Pentecost Stollen. A bit silly really when you think about it, on the other hand... clever if you love Stollen and want to bake and eat it more often than just at Christmas time. I wanted to change the Stollen a little for Easter, a bit different and more with a summery feel to it. So I made a tropical one, no raisins, but tropical fruit, no almonds, but coconut shivers. With almond paste of course, we all love that, no matter what time of the year.
Happy Easter!

Tropical Easter Stollen

(makes 1 large Stollen)

(PRINT recipe)

Dough:
550 g bread flour
1,5 TBsp dry active yeast
1 tsp grated lemon zest
1 tsp grated orange zest
2 TBsp sugar
1 egg yolk
50 g unsalted butter, melted and cooled
250 g luke warm milk
1 tsp salt

Fruit filling:
40 g dried figs, cubed
3 TBsp Malibu (coconut/rum liquor)
70 g candied papaya, cut into pieces
90 g apricots, cut into pieces
30 g dates, in pieces
150 g candied pineapple, chopped roughly
45 g candied melon, in pieces
25 g coconut shavings

Almond paste filling:
300 g almond paste
1/4 egg white

Topping:
1/4 egg white and 1 tsp water, whisked
15 g coconut shavings
icing sugar
Soak the chopped figs in the Malibu

Make the dough by placing all the ingredients in a mixer bowl with the kneading hook attached. Mix the ingredients on speed one until all the ingredients are incorporated. Increase the speed to 2 (or 3) and mix for about 6-8 minutes, until you get a souple and elastic dough. Adjusting with milk (or use the drained Malibu from the figs!) or flour to get the right consistency. Let the dough rest for about 15 minutes to relax.

Drain the figs (if you haven't already). Mix the fruit into the dough. For me the handiest way to do this is to lightly grease the working surface, spread out the dough, divide the filling over it and roll it up tightly. Press it and shape into a ball. Grease the mixing bowl and place the dough in it. Cover with plastic and let rise until doubled.

Prepare the almond filling by mixing the egg white and the almond paste, it shouldn't be too wet. The almond paste should be rolled into a long round roll with a 3 cm diameter. Roll in plastic wrap and place in the fridge until you need it.

Spread out the dough into a large oval, place the almond paste roll lengthways a little out of the middle and fold over the top half of the dough. Press it down so it won't open during baking. Place on a baking sheet with baking parchment on it. Brush it with the eggwhite (whisked with a little water) and sprinkle with the coconut shavings. Cover with greased plastic and let rise until doubled.

Preheat the oven to 200ºC in the meantime.

Bake the stollen in the middle of the oven for about 40-50 minutes. Tent the bread with foil when it gets brown too quick. When the bread is done, take it out and let it cool on a wire rack. Dust with icing sugar before serving.

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Paasstol

Het is eigenlijk wel grappig dat we de "stol" die we met Kerst kopen/maken en eten natuurlijk gewoon hetzelfde is als die we met Pasen eten, we noemen hem dan alleen Paasstol. En met Pinksteren komt hij nog eens langs als Pinksterstol. Een commerciële truc of gewoon handig om die heerlijke stol ook in andere periodes te eten dan alleen met Kerst? Ik houd het maar op het laatste, want een goede stol is gewoon heerlijk.

Maar voor Pasen wilde ik de stol toch iets anders maken, wat iets meer een zomergevoel geeft. Daarom heb ik er een tropische stol van gemaakt, geen rozijnen, maar ananas en papaya, geen amandelschaafsel maar kokosnootschaafsel. De amandelspijs zit er natuurlijk wel in, daar zijn we hier allemaal gek op! Fijne Paasdagen allemaal.

Tropische Paasstol
(1 grote stol)

(recept PRINTEN)

Deeg:
550 g sterke bloem
1,5 el droge gist
1 tl geraspte citroenschil
1 tl geraspte sinaasappelschil
2 el suiker
1 eidooier
50 g ongezouten boter, gesmolten en iets afgekoeld
250 g lauwe melk
1 tl zout

Fruitvulling:
40 g gedroogde vijgen, in stukjes
3 el Malibu (kokosnoot/rum likeur)
70 g geconfijte papaya, in stukjes
90 g gedroogde abrikozen, in stukjes
30 g dadels, in stukjes
150 g gekonfijte ananas, in stukjes
45 g gekonfijte meloen, in stukjes
25 g geschaafde (gedroogde) kokosnoot

Spijsvulling:
300 g amandelspijt
1/4 eiwit

Bovenop:
1/4 eiwit en 1 tl water, geklutst
15 g kokosnoot schaafsel
poedersuiker

Wel de gehakte vijgen in de Malibu.

Maak het deeg door alle deeg(!)ingrediënten in een grote mixerkom te doen, gebruik de kneedhaak en meng de ingrediënten op snelheid 1. Verhoog dan de snelheid (2 of 3) en kneed ongeveer 6-8 minuten tot je een soepel en elastisch deeg krijgt. Voeg zo nodig melk (of de Malibu waarin de vijgen geweekt zijn) of bloem toe om het deeg de juiste natheid te geven. Laat het deeg ongeveer 15 minuten afgedekt rusten.

Giet de vijgen af (als je dat nog niet gedaan hebt). Meng het fruit door het deeg. Ik vind dat het makkelijkste door je werkoppervlak licht in te vetten, hier het deeg op uit te spreiden en de fruitvulling erover te verspreiden. Rol het deeg dan strak op en druk het goed dicht. Vorm er ene bal van, leg het in een ingevette kom, dek af en laat het rijzen tot verdubbeld.

Bereid de amandelspijs voor. Meng ¼ eiwit door het amandelspijs (maak het niet te nat). Maak hier een lange rol van (zolang ongeveer als je brood zal worden), wikkel het in plastic folie en leg het zolang in de koelkast.

Vet je werkoppervlak licht in. Druk het deeg uit tot een grote lange ovaal en leg de spijs rol iets uit het midden in de lengte erop. Vouw de ovaal dicht en druk licht aan, zodat het niet opengaat tijdens het bakken. Leg het (diagonaal) op een bakplaat bekleed met bakpapier. Bestrijk het met ¼ eiwit gemengd met wat water en bestrooi met het kokosschaafsel. Dek af met ingevet plastic en laat het rijzen tot het verdubbeld is.

Verwarm ondertussen de oven voor op 200ºC.

Bak de stol in het midden van de oven ongeveer 40-50 minuten. Kijk halverwege even of de stol niet te snel bruin wordt, dek anders af met aluminiumfolie. Als het brood gaar is, laat je het afkoelen op een rooster. Bestrooi met poedersuiker voor serveren.
Fijne Paasdagen!

2011-04-24T10:05:00.002+02:00

Bread Baking Babes scare vampires

2011-04-17T14:31:00.007+02:00

This month our lovely and very talented Natashya ("Living in the kitchen with puppies") made sure we won't be attacked in our sleeps by vampires. A wonderful rustic loaf with garlic... lots of garlic! But fear not that you'll blow your spouse into a coma, the garlic (3 whole bulbs!!!) is sautéed and sweet caramelised. A bit of tang from the Balsamico, I used a very old and thick balsamico, therefor my garlic cloves look a little darker than most, but no fear they're not burned. The dough was quite wet, maybe wetter than the picture showed in the book. But hey we handled wetter doughs, so no worries about that mate!

The fragrance in your kitchen will be a delight. I made three smaller loaves and they went very well with soup. Although the kids liked the taste, they were a bit squeamish about have to eat those garlic pieces. Maybe they were a bit too large (even though I halve the biggest cloves), as that can vary a lot from bulb to bulb.

You're smelling it already right? You wanna bake this too right? Bake, enjoy, post and send your details (and picture of the bread) to Natashya. (livinginthekitchenwithpuppies AT hotmail DOT com) so she can add you to the round up and send you a Bread Baking Buddy Badge. Deadline 29th of this month.

Dan's Garlic Bread

(2 medium or 3 small loaves)

(PRINT recipe)

for the pre-ferment
200 ml water, at about 35ºC - 38ºC (95F - 101F)
1 tsp fast acting yeast
200 g strong white bakers flour

for the dough
225 ml water at 20ºC (68F)
325 g strong white bakers flour
10 g sea salt
75 ml extra virgin olive oil

for the garlic filling
3 heads garlic, separated
2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
50 ml water
1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar
2 tablespoons caster sugar
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
1 spring fresh rosemary, leaves picked and chopped

for the pre-ferment
To easily get the temperature of the water roughly correct measure 100ml of boiling water and add 200ml cold water, then measure the amount you need from this. Stir in the yeast then, when dissolved, stir in the flour until evenly combined.

Leave the mixture covered at about 20C - 22C (warmish room temperature) for 2 hours, stirring the ferment once after an hour to bring the yeast in contact with new starch to ferment.

for the garlic filling
Break the heads of garlic into cloves and place in a saucepan, cover with boiling water from the kettle and simmer for 3 - 4 minutes.

Then strain the garlic from the water, cover the cloves with cold water to cool then peel the slivery skin from the garlic. It's surprising how few cloves you get after peeling so don't be alarmed if "3 heads of garlic" sound like way too much.

Heat the olive oil in a frying pan then place the add the cloves to it and cook until they are lightly brown (not burnt) on the outside. If you burn the garlic the flavour is nasty and you will have to start again, or serve it to your friends with a straight face, so watch them carefully.

Measure the balsamic and the water then add this to the pan with the sugar, salt, pepper and rosemary. Simmer for 5 minutes until the liquid has reduced to a thick caramel. Scrape into a bowl and leave to cool. The garlic cloves should be tender when pierced with a knife.

back to the dough:
After 2 hours the pre-ferment should have doubled and look bubbly on the surface. Measure the water into a bowl and tip the pre-ferment into it. Break it up with your fingers until only small thread-like bits remain (this is the elastic gluten you can feel in your fingers)

Add the flour and salt then stir the mixture together with your hands. It will feel very sticky and elastic. Scrape any remaining dough from your hands, cover the bowl and leave for 10 minutes so that the flour has time to absorb moisture before being kneaded. Be sure to scrape around the bowl to make sure all of the flour is incorporated into the dough.

Pour 2 tbsp olive oil onto the surface of the dough and smooth it over the surface with your hands. Now rub a little oil on your hands and start to tuck your fingers down the side of the dough, then pull the dough upward stretching it out.

Rotate the bowl as you do this, so that all of the dough gets pulled and stretched. You'll find that the dough starts to feel and look smoother. Leave the dough in a ball, cover and leave for 10 minutes.

Repeat the pulling and stretching of the dough, for no more than about 10 - 12 seconds. You may find that an oiling piece of dough breaks through the upper surface. This isn't a bad thing, but it is a sing to stop working the dough. Cover the bowl again and leave for a further 10 minutes.

This time oil a piece of the worksurface about 30 cm in diameter. Oil your hands, pick the dough out of the bowl, place it on the oiled surface and knead it gently for 10 - 15 seconds. Return the dough to the bowl, cover and leave for 30 minutes.

Uncover the dough, oil the worksurface once more and flip the dough out onto it.
Stretch the dough out into a rectangle, then fold the right hand side in by a third.

Then fold the in by thirds again so that your left with a square dough parcel. Place this back in the bowl, cover and leave for 30 minutes.

Lightly oil the worksurface again and stretch the dough out to cover an area roughly 30cm x 20cm. Dot the garlic over the 2/3rds of the surface and then fold the bare piece of dough over a third of the garlic-covered dough.

Then roll this fold of dough over so that the remaining garlic-covered piece is covered by dough. Then fold this piece of dough in by a third...then in by a third again. Finally place the folded dough back in the bowl, cover and leave for 30 minutes.

Wipe the oil off the worksurface and lightly dust it with flour. Pin the dough out again as above and fold it in by thirds each way. Replace it in the bowl, cover and leave for a further 30 minutes.

Pin the dough out again fold it in by thirds each way again as shown. Leave the dough for 10 minutes while you prepare the tray the bread will rise on. Cover a large dinner tray with a tea-towel. Lightly dust it with white flour, then cut the dough into thirds with a serrated knife. Place the dough cut side upward on the tray then pinch the fabric between each so that they stay separated.

Cover and leave for 45 minutes while you heat the oven to 200C (same for fan assisted)/390F/gas mark 5-6. I put a large unglazed terracotta tile in the oven and shovel the dough directly onto it with the back of a small cookie tray. It gives a much better finish and perhaps the bread is slightly crisper, but the bread will still be good placed on a tray just before baking. I also put a small tray of water in the bottom of the oven so that the heat is a little moist, which will help the bread to rise and colour.

Lightly dust the back of a cookie tray (if you have a stone in the oven) or the surface of a baking tray with semolina or flour. Carefully pick the dough up off the cloth, scooping it in from end to end with your finger then quickly lift it clear of the cloth and onto the tray.

Either shovel the dough onto the hot stone, or place the baking tray in the oven, shut the door quickly and bake for 20 - 30 minutes until the loaves are a good rich golden brown.

(adapted from "Exceptional Breads" by Dan Lepard)

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Bread Baking Babes bestrijden vampieren

Het heeft even geduurd, maar eindelijk nu ook de NL-versie van het recept.

Dan's Knoflookbrood
(2 middelgrote of 3 kleine broden)

(recept PRINTEN)

voordeeg
200 ml water, ongeveer 35ºC - 38ºC
1 tl droge gist
200 g sterke bloem

deeg
225 ml water van 20ºC
325 g sterke bloem
10 g zout
75 ml olijfoliel

knoflookvulling
3 knoflookbollen
2 el olijfolie
50 ml water
1 el balsamico azijn
2 el suiker
1 tl zout
1/4 tl zwarte peper
1 takje verse rozemarijn, blaadjes gehakt

Voordeeg
Meng het gist met het water en de bloem, dek het af en laat het op kamertemperatuur ongeveer 2 uur staan. Roer het na 1 uur een keer door.

Knoflookvulling
Haal alle teentjes los en doe ze in een pan. Giet er kokend water over hen en laat ze ongeveer 3 - 4 minuten zachtjes koken. Giet de teentjes af, doe de teentjes in koud water en pel ze.

Verhit de olijfolie in een koekenpan en fruit de teentjes daarin zachtjes licht bruin. Voeg dan de balsamico, water, suiker, zout, peper en rozemarijn toe. Laat het 5 minuten zachtjes sudderen tot het een dikke stroop is. Doe het in een kommetje en laat het afkoelen. De teentjes moeten zacht zijn als je er met een mes in prikt.

Deeg
Na 2 uur is het voordeeg verdubbeld en vol bubbels. Voeg het water toe (wat onder ‘deeg’ staat) en meng het voordeeg hiermee. Voeg de bloem en zout toe en meng het. Het is erg plakkerig. Dek de kom af en laat het 10 minuten rusten, zodat het meel het water op kan nemen voordat het gekneed wordt.
Giet 2 el olijfolie op het deeg en wrijf het erover uit met je handen. Steek je handen onder het deeg, pak het en trek het omhoog en leg het weer boven op. Draai de kom steeds een slag en blijf het deeg zo uitrekken en terugleggen. Ga hiermee door tot het deeg er gladder uitziet en voelt. Maak er een bal van dek af en laat 10 minuten rusten.
Herhaal nu het uitrekken en vouwen, maar zo’n 12 seconden. Dek af en laat weer 10 minuten rusten.

Vet nu je werkoppervlak in, een cirkel van ongeveer 30 cm doorsnede. Vet je handen in met olie, haal het deeg uit de kom en kneed het heel kort. Leg het deeg terug in de kom, dek af en laat 30 minuten rusten.

Leg het deeg op een vet oppervlak en trek het uit tot een rechthoek. Vouw één derde naar het midden, vouw één derde aan de andere kant erover heen (een zakenbrief vouw). Herhaal deze vouw methode en je hebt nu een vierkant ‘pakje’ voor je liggen. Leg dit in de kom, dek af en laat 30 minuten rusten.

Trek het deeg uit op een ingevet oppervlak tot een rechthoek van ongeveer 30cm x 20cm. Verspreid de knoflookteentjes over ⅔ van het deeg. Vouw dan het lege ⅓ deel van het deeg over één derde van het deeg waar de knoflook op ligt. Vouw dit verder over het laatste deel deeg met knoflook. Vouw dit nogmaals in drieën, leg het in een ingevette kom, dek af en laat 30 minuten rijzen.

Bebloem het werkoppervlak, trek het deeg nogmaals uit tot een rechthoek en vouw het net als hierboven in drieën. Leg het deeg terug in de kom en laat het 30 minuten rusten.

Herhaal dit vouwen nogmaals. Laat het deeg dan 10 minuten rusten, terwijl je een plaat voorbereidt waar het deeg op zal rijzen.

Bedek een bakplaat met een theedoek, strooi hier veel bloem over. Snijdt het deeg in drie delen en leg die delen met de snijkant naar boven op de doek. Trek tussen de broden de doek iets omhoog zodat ze niet aan elkaar kleven. Dek af met ingevet plastic en laat het 45 minuten rijzen, terwijl je ondertussen de oven voorverwarmt op 200ºC. Dit brood bak je het liefst op een ovensteen voor het beste resultaat. Zet ook een metalen bakje met wat water onderin de oven dat je meeverwarmt.

Verplaats het deeg na de rijs voorzichtig naar een bebloemde bakplaat (op de kop, zodat je het deeg eraf kunt schuiven op de steen). Schuif de broden op de steen, doe de deur dicht en bak de broden 20 - 30 minuten tot de broden mooi goudbruin zijn. Laat ze afkoelen op een rooster.

(bewerkt naar “Exceptional Breads” - Dan Lepard)

Mellow Bakers in April

2011-04-10T10:12:00.038+02:00

Another month, another display of the breads baked for the Mellow Bakers challenge (which is baking our way through the Jeffrey Hamleman's "Bread").

Pain au Levain. No problems. I've added a pinch of yeast to help the starter and reduce the sourness, which is a way that really works for me. Lovely crumb.

Pain au levain with whole wheat flour. Same here with a small percentage of whole wheat flour. Lovely bread and nice holes.

Pain au levain with mixed sourdough starters. And another version. This time without the pinch of yeast, because I had a very fresh and active starter at hand. For me using two different style sourdough starters doesn't add much.

Flax Bread. For this bread I used lightly crushed (broken) flaxseeds, it just was the only kind I had available. It took me about 30 minutes to bake 1 loaf. Very nice and healthy bread.

Last, but certainly not least, this Hazelnut and fig bread with fennel seeds and rosemary. A fantastic bread, with so much flavour from the fennel, rosemary and figs. Great combination. Will make this again, even though the kids keep picking out all the fennel seeds :).

And there they were for this month, see you again for the May breads.